


We Are Robin Hood

by LadyMarianne



Category: Robin Hood (BBC 2006), Robin Hood - All Media Types
Genre: AU season 2 finale, Character Death, F/M, Heavily Edited, I'm stuck with my other story so I'm doing this, Not a Guy/Marian story, Originally Posted on FanFiction.Net, Up by popular demand
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-14
Updated: 2018-12-02
Packaged: 2019-05-06 21:35:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 55,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14656698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyMarianne/pseuds/LadyMarianne
Summary: At the end of season II, Marian doesn't try to kill the Sheriff and consequently is never taken to the Holy Land. What will happen to those who do go, and those who stay behind? And what will happen when the King finally returns?---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------After three years, I thought it was high time I took another look at this. I was supposed to post it as it was, with maybe a few tweaks here and there, but knowing me, that is not going to happen. It is going to be the same story, but better -hopefully.If you're reading my other story and I owe you a reply, please know that I will get to you in time. I promise. Similarly, if you comment this (which I hope you do), I will reply eventually. Just give me some time, please.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Athenais_Penelope_Clemence](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Athenais_Penelope_Clemence/gifts).



> I know I've been a terrible correspondent lately, worse than I usually am. Please accept this as my gift to all of those who enjoy my work but don't enjoy my lack of replies so much. If you liked this story the first time, you will really like it again, because I'm confident I can make it even better. Or at least that's the plan. 
> 
> I will do my best to get back to any messages in a timely fashion, but in the meantime, you should swing by my newly created blog. I will try to keep that updated so you'll have an idea why I fall behind with replies. Also, I will address some points raised in some reviews, so it will be some sort of reply -though, again, I *will* also reply in the traditional way. The link will be at the end of this chapter. 
> 
> As usual, thanks for the support. It truly does mean a lot, even if I don't always show it.

**CHAPTER I**

Everything was set.

The ship had been found. The crew had been talked to. The fees had been paid. The plans had been made. All that was left now was waiting for the tide and then they would be gone.

Robin Hood waited.

It was hard to believe that it had only been a handful of months since he stood here, at this very spot, gazing at the ship that had just brought him back home after a long journey and vowed that he would never, ever be in this situation again. And yet here he was, about to set sail to the Holy Land for the second time in his life.

So much was the same as it had been before, and yet so much had changed in the last two years. For one, he wasn’t Robin of Locksley anymore. That young nobleman who had come to Portsmouth looking to make a difference –maybe seeking some glory in the process, he might as well admit to that–, frustrated because the woman he loved didn’t seem to understand just how important this was, had long since ceased to exist –probably from the moment he set foot in that desert, he thought.

He wasn’t after glory either. He had the truth on his side: he was leaving because he  _had to_ , because he was the only one who could have any hope of saving his King and not even Marian could disagree with him this time.

That much hadn’t changed, he reflected with a smile. Marian. It might be seven years later, but the fear of losing her was just as strong as it had been the first time that he had been in Portsmouth. Except that now, it wasn’t his own safety he was worried about –or maybe it was, just a little bit. He wasn’t afraid of not coming back to her, but rather of what he would find when he did.

She had told him the first time that she wouldn’t wait for him, that, should he return, he would find her a married woman, surrounded by children, living the life he had obviously not wanted for himself. He had believed her, or at least tried to. Standing at the very spot where he was standing now, waiting for the ship to be ready as he was now, he had seriously considered the possibility of turning back and going to her. Because no amount of glory would ever compare to the joy of being around her, of holding her in his arms or running after her in Sherwood Forest. But he hadn’t –he couldn’t have. He had made up his mind and given his word to the King. If Marian didn’t understand that... Well, maybe he ought to find himself another woman, one who saw how important his role was. And so he had left, and he had deluded himself into thinking that he didn’t care about what became of Marian. But he had never given up on her completely. He had realised that as he saw her stepping out of her father’s house –gloriously unattached and with no kids in sight. She had waited for him –whether she cared to admit it or not– and in that moment he knew that whatever happened, whatever came their way, they  _would_ be together. They were meant to be.

But it was different this time because England was different. Before, it had been their own pride that could have torn them apart. Now, there was some real evil lurking, and Marian was currently standing in the middle of the lion’s den.

She would disagree, obviously. She would argue that she was perfectly safe, since the lions were currently out. But for how long? What if he failed? What if he succeeded but the Sheriff got away? What would be of her then?

And it wasn’t just her that he was worried about either –that was different too. He had people now, people who counted on him to protect them, to provide for them. He couldn’t simply disappear –he owed them better than that. But he couldn’t go back now. There wasn’t enough time –the Sheriff and Gisborne had already left, so they couldn’t afford to miss this particular ship– and even if he  _could_ go, he knew Marian would never agree to being left behind again.

But what could he possibly do?

He cast a look around himself, as if he expected the answer to all his worries to materialise out of thin air. And that’s when he saw it.

His gang.

 _We are Robin Hood_ , he had told them once, many months ago. He had meant it then and still meant it now. Because Robin Hood was so much bigger than himself: Robin Hood was the whole of Nottingham, every peasant that suffered from the Sheriff, every parent that didn’t have enough to feed their family – _they_ were Robin Hood. His gang was Robin Hood.

Robin had to go to the Holy Land to save his king, but Robin Hood didn’t. Robin Hood belonged in England.

Smiling now, he cast another look around himself, this time paying a closer attention to each of the members of his gang. He knew that he could only leave one –they would never agree to let him go alone, much as he would prefer it–, so he needed to decide who was better suited for the job.

Much was the closest to him, as usual. He was getting everything ready for them, sorting their weapons and whatnot, at the same time keeping a vigilant eye on his master, should he require anything from him. Much was probably the least excited about taking this journey out the whole gang, next to Robin himself. But he would never agree to stay behind, not unless he could persuade Robin to stay too. He had decided long ago that he would follow the former master of Locksley to the ends of the world, regardless of his own discomfort. No, Much would not do.

A little bit further than Much stood Djaq, who was the exact opposite of the man. Her face was glowing with anticipation and she was practically bouncing as she talked amicably to Will. Robin knew that this was in part due to the conversation the two had shared a few hours ago and the revelations said conversation had brought, but there was something else. While all of them were going to strange lands, Djaq was going home. She would probably stay if he asked her, but he didn’t think he could. She deserved to go back -he, of all people, should know what it was like being alone in a country that was not one’s own, surrounded by people that looked down upon you for the colour of one’s skin. He couldn’t ask Will either. He would never part with her.

Allan stood the closest to the ship, trying to stay out of the way as much as possible. This was probably for the best. After all, one doesn’t betray their friends and then expect everything to go back to normal when one sees fit to return, right? He had started on the right foot, what with saving their lives and tipping them off about Vaisey’s trip to the Holy Land, but he still had a long way to go. The fact that he wasn’t going out of his way to please everyone was a good sign: it showed that he at least understood their need to process this new development in their relationship on their own.

Robin eyed him for a moment longer. He remembered Allan’s words –his reasons for doing what he had done– and he also remembered the fact that nothing overly bad had happened while he was acting as Gisborne’s right-hand man. He could have easily given them away –given  _Marian_ away–, but he hadn’t. No, Robin decided; Allan had not betrayed them so much as he had tried to save his own skin. His way of thinking was questionable, that’s for sure, but he wasn’t a traitor. He would trust him with his life if it came to it, but he wasn’t sure he would trust him with England –at least not for now.

And then his eyes found the last member of his small group. John stood by the road that had brought them here, looking back at what they were leaving behind. He hadn’t been to the Holy Land, but he had heard enough about it from Much to be dreading the journey. Robin considered John for a moment.

John was like a moral compass for them all. He was the one who was constantly reminding them of what they were fighting for, and when Robin was too caught up with his own personal agenda, John would be the one who told him to quit his antics and focus on the bigger picture. If there was one amongst them who could say that he was in on the fight purely because he wanted to help the people out, that was John Little. Everyone else had some kind of ulterior motif, but not John.

He was also big enough to be able to carry most of the workload alone, and he had been in the forest for years now, so he knew it like the back of his hand. He had had his own gang before Robin’s return, so he was used to making decisions and could recruit more people, should the need arise. More importantly, Marian trusted him and if he were to tell her to leave the castle, she would probably listen to him. (And, should it come to that, he could always forcefully remove her himself).

In short, John was his man.

Having made up his mind and recognising that there wasn’t much time left, Robin made his way to the man that had become a sort of fatherly figure for them over the past two years. Much noticed the movement and made it to follow him, but he shook his head.

He stopped next to John and followed his gaze. They were too far away from Sherwood to really see anything, but that was not a problem, since it was all they could see in their minds’ eyes.

"Beautiful, isn’t it?" he asked conversationally. "When I was a kid, I would spend as much time as I possibly could in the forest. Much always complained when he had to come and find me," he chuckled softly, remembering the times when he was young and carefree and most of his time was spent coming up with new places to hide from Much. "I never would have guessed that I would end up outlawed and living in the forest."

John smiled slightly.

"Life is funny like that," he said.

"That, it is," the young man agreed. "I wish we didn’t have to go."

"It’s not as if we have a choice. Vaisey is going to kill the King, and no amount of good deeds here is going to save us," the man replied sadly.

Robin smiled, pleased at the opening John had given him.

"No,  _I_ don’t have a choice," he said, turning to face the man. " _I_  have to go. I’m the only one the King will listen to,  _if_  he listens to anyone. You, on the other hand, can stay."

John frowned, clearly not catching his drift. Robin explained himself further.

"Listen, best case scenario, we go to the Holy Land, we warn the King, we stop Vaisey and we come back –that is, if we don’t run into any complication, and let’s face it, when have we ever  _not_  ran into some sort of complication. Even then we are going to be gone for months. We have not prepared the people for our absence –they will have no idea where we went– and they will suffer. Not to mention the fact that the Sheriff has probably left some kind of system in place to torture the peasants further. Robin Hood cannot disappear like that."

"What are you saying?"

"I’m saying that you have to stay. Help people,  _be_ Robin Hood. That’s the whole point of this whole thing, is it not? What good would it be if we stop Vaisey but half the people in Nottingham perishes in our absence? Saving the King is important, but so is  _this_. You know that, you’re probably the only one who gets it!"

John was silent for a moment longer. Robin could see in his dark eyes how torn he was: on the one hand, he recognised the truth in Robin’s words, since he had already considered the matter himself; but on the other hand, he couldn’t just stay while the rest risked their lives in a far-away land.

"We are a team," he said finally, still apprehensive.

"Yes, we are. That’s why I’m asking you this. It’s no different than when we separate and go to different villages, except that this time..."

"You will be going to the Holy Land," he finished. Robin nodded. "It’s a bit different, I reckon. And much more dangerous."

“It’s a risk,” the leader admitted. “But it’s like you said, it’s not as if we have a choice, do we? The way I see it, we have to make the best out of a bad situation.”

John was silent for a long moment, thinking hard about what his friend was saying.

At last, he spoke.

“Does this have anything to do with Marian?”

Robin decided to reply with the truth, because he owed it to his friend. After all, he was asking a lot from him, he deserved to know the whole truth.

“In part,” he admitted. “She’s alone in the castle and she has no idea of what we are planning, so of course I would prefer she heard the news from a friend. _But_ ,” he added hastily, “don’t get me wrong, this is about the peasants, too; about the whole of England. _Robin Hood_ cannot abandon his people just like this –it wouldn’t be fair.”

“You’ve come a long way from the conceited little prat you used to be when you were younger, you know that, right?”

“Why, thank you. I really appreciate that. Would you mind telling Marian that?”

“She knows,” John chuckled. “I doubt she’ll tell you, but she’s really proud of you, Robin. We all are.”

Once upon a time, Robin would have accepted the compliment almost as his birthright, but John was right that he had come a long way since those days.

“Make sure you keep up my good name, okay?”

“I haven’t agreed yet,” the older man reminded him.

“Not in so many words, but I know you’ll do as I’ve asked. You are a smart man, John, you know that there’s no way around it.”

“That may be the case, but I will need something from you in return.”

Robin frowned, surprised at that. He hadn’t anticipated that John would have many hesitations regarding his plan.

“And what is that?”

John looked him square in the eye, imposing as he was, with a stern look on his face. For a brief moment, Robin felt like a small child facing his father after some mischief.

“I will stay back in Nottingham. I will keep up with your work as Robin Hood. I’ll feed your peasants, take care of them while you’re away. I’ll even find the way to take Marian out of the castle if I think she might be in trouble. In turn, you’ll go to the Holy Land, you’ll talk to the king to inform him of his impending danger and then you’ll get in the first ship back _and return home_.”

The young man smiled, relieved that that was all that John was asking of him.

“That’s the plan.”

“It’s a hell more than the ‘plan’, Robin, that is what _needs_ to happen. I know you, you’ll want to stay back to make sure that everything goes as you want, but not here –not this time. Your job is to _warn_ the king –if he doesn’t take your warning seriously, that’s _his_ problem. By the time Vaisey acts, you have to be on your way back to England. Those are my terms.”

“Sounds –reasonable, I suppose.”

“Do you accept?”

Out of the corner of his eye, Robin could see that the preparations had begun for the ship to set sail and he felt a certain urgency gripping at his heart. Their time was running out.

"She can’t stay at the castle, even without Vaisey and Gisborne," he said quickly, fixing John with a stern look of his own. "She’ll argue and say she’s perfectly capable of looking after herself, but you have to make sure that she leaves. I don’t know what sort of plans Vaisey has for her and frankly I don’t care to find out. She has to go. She has a cousin in Sussex, I think. Tell her to go to her. Or tell her to join a convent. I don’t care. I’ll find her when I come back. But she’s leaving Nottingham, is that understood? Use whatever means you see fit to take her out." John nodded. "And tell her that... Tell her that I’m sorry for doing this to her again –that I truly never intended to go back. She has to understand that, okay? Please."

"Robin!" Much called from behind them. "It’s time."

Robin waved a hand in his direction to let him know he had heard, but continued talking to John.

“That’s a yes, then?”

“It is. I will do my absolute best to return, John. You have my word,” he vowed.

"Robin!" Now Djaq had joined Much.

"Just in case, though,” he added, ignoring his friends once again. “Here," he said, pulling the tag Will had made for them from his neck and placing it in John’s palm. "Give this to her as a reminder that she is part of the gang."

John took it and clasped his hand tightly.

"Till we meet again," he said with certainty.

"Till we meet again," Robin agreed.

Tearing himself from the man’s grasp was much harder than he had imagined and for the first time since he had decided to leave, Robin was glad that he hadn’t had the chance to say goodbye to Marian. No way would he have been able to leave her, he realized.

He sent his friend what he hoped was a cheeky grin, took a deep breath and turned on his heels. And thus he left the man standing there, and walked swiftly towards the ship that was to take him away from everything he held dear.

"What about John?" Will asked him as he passed them, noticing that the larger man had made no move to reach them.

"He’s staying," he replied with finality.

Much opened his mouth to ask something, but closed it when he saw the determined look on his master’s face. There would be plenty of time for explanations. For now they had to go.

John watched them until they were but a dot in the horizon, Robin’s tag clutched in his hand. Then, once he was certain there was nothing left for him there, he turned on his heels and set out on the long journey back home.

He had a mission to accomplish.

He was Robin Hood now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://writerladymarianne.blogspot.com.ar/


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really hated chapter two, so I made a completely new chapter two. Hope you guys enjoy it.
> 
> Once again, thank you all for the continuous support.

**CHAPTER II.**

During the course of the last few weeks, Kate had gotten quite used to life in the forest. She missed her mother, obviously, but John and the others were kind and patient with her, so life as an outlaw wasn’t as bad as she had originally supposed it would be.

One thing she hadn’t gotten used to, though, was the amount of dead time she sometimes had in her hands. There was a lot of planning and a lot of acting, but there was a lot of time in between, too, and that didn’t sit well with her. It was worse for her as the youngest and newest member of the gang, since her companions often prefered to keep her on the sidelines as much as they possibly could.

For example, at this particular moment in time, they were all off on different errands and here Kate sat, waiting for their return. She didn’t like it one bit.

At least she had been able to convince them to let her join them in Locksley, so while she had spent the better part of the morning alone in their camp, now she was at Dead Man’s Crossing, waiting for them. It wasn’t much, but it was something.

She had arrived much sooner than she was expected to, so when she heard loud voices making their way down the road, she was quite certain that they were not her friends. Curious as she was, she decided to take a look.

The voices belonged to two young men, one blonde and one with strawberry-blonde hair. They were about the same height and about the same built, though the blonde one looked slightly shorter and leaner than the other.

Kate was very careful not to be seen, but she soon realized that her precautions were for nothing, since they appeared to be in the middle of a heated argument and they weren’t paying attention to their surroundings.

“I’m not saying we _don’t_ tell her, all I’m saying is we set out to tell her _in the morning_ ,” the blonde man was saying. For the looks of it, this wasn’t the first time the same words had come out of his mouth.

“And how will that change anything?”

“ _Exactly_ ! The news we have for her are still going to be awful, but at least we will be fed and well-rested! We’ve been travelling for _months,_ Much, don’t we deserve at least one day at home before we set out again?”

“ _Home,_ ” the taller man snorted. “I bet it’ll be _lovely_ to be back at the camp,” he said, his words dripping with sarcasm.

“We knew it’d be hard, but we did give him our word,” the blonde man reminded his friend gently.

“He gave his word that he’d be back, and look what good that was,” he pointed out angrily, causing his friend to throw his hands up in exasperation. “Besides, we also promised him that we would tell her what happened, so-”

“You’re being purposefully thick, you know that, right?” The other man ignored him and resumed his walking. “We don’t even know she’s _there_ ,” he tried to reason.

Kate had heard enough. Normally she wouldn’t be allowed to approach travellers on her own, but these two appeared to be unarmed and weren’t paying any attention to her. It should be simple enough to relieve them of their money, and maybe after that, the other would see she wasn’t as useless as they imagined her to be.

She fixed her clothes and hair in an effort to look fiercer than she actually was. She gripped her bow tightly, took a deep breath and emerged from the trees she had been hiding behind. Since neither men appeared to have noticed her, she released an arrow to call attention to herself. It worked, and for a brief moment, she was very pleased to see utter shock on both their faces.

However, much to Kate’s dismay, shock was short-lived and immediately replaced by annoyance and amusement. Neither one of these men appeared to be the least bit threatened by her presence, which was annoying if not downright hurtful.

“Guess we’re going to the camp after all,” said the blonde man, completely ignoring the young woman who was now blocking their path.

“Maybe _you_ are; I'm going to Sussex,” replied the other man stubbornly.

“No one is going anywhere,” said Kate, striving to sound confident. “At least not until you've paid your fee. It'll be-”

“A tenth of what we're carrying, unless we lie, in which case you take the lot,” the first man interrupted. “Yeah, yeah, we know the drill. Where's John?”

Kate was beyond surprised at the man's familiarity both with the process and her leader, but she tried hard not to show it.

“Who?” she asked.

“John Little. Big man, bushy beard… Kind of looks like a giant but deep down has a heart of gold. He's the one who recruited you, right?”

If Kate was surprised before, now she was downright shocked.

“I don't -I don't know what you're talking about,” she stammered, her fists clenched around her bow. In contrast, the blonde man looked utterly at ease and even more amused than before.

“While you two deal with that, I'm going to go find Marian. If you'll excuse me-”

“Oh, come on, Much! Don't you want to see John?”

“Who wants to see John?” Asked a deep voice from the trees on the other side of the road. A moment later, a tall, broad figure was emerging, his eyes wide as he took in the scene before him. “Allan! Much! You are back!”

Allan turned his attention from Kate to the newly arrived man, one of his oldest and dearest friends. Regardless of what was sure to be a very painful recounting of the last few months, he was certainly glad to be back. He had missed his home.

Much, too, felt a small amount of relief at the sight of his old friend. The truth was that he had missed him, and much as he wanted to get to Sussex to get the painful task he had been entrusted with over with, he couldn't deny that the familiar sight was a welcomed change after the last few months spent surrounded by strangers -and Allan.

“It's good to see you, John,” he admitted.

“It's good to see you too. Everything's been quieter without you around.”

“Hold on for a moment. You know these people?” Kate demanded.

“Of course! They are friends. Allan, Much, meet Kate. She's recently joined the gang.”

Allan turned to greet her, but his eye immediately caught another figure standing just behind her shoulder. The figure was dressed in black and was wearing a hood and a mask that covered most of their face. Still, Allan had no problem recognising them.

“You’re not in Sussex,” he said stupidly. Behind the mask, the figure frowned, but their lips twitched slightly.

“I never said I would be, did I?”

Allan bit his lip and shook his head in dismay. He hadn't counted on this, though -in hindsight- maybe he should have. The woman he had befriended after long months spent in the castle would have never agreed to part with her people for something as unimportant as her _safety_. Really, Allan was disappointed with himself that he had ever expected any different.

Having made sure that she was surrounded by friends and not foes, the figure removed their mask and hood. Dark curls came cascading down her back and thin lips curled up in a smile.

“I'm so happy to see you!” She exclaimed, and with that she threw herself at Allan, wrapping her thin arms around his neck and pulling herself closer to him.

After a moment, Lady Marian of Knighton stepped back and transferred her attention to the other traveler, the one who was currently watching her with a horrified expression on his face.

Much had been making a big deal out of going to find Marian from the moment they had set foot in England. But much as he had been talking a good game, the truth was that the prospect absolutely _terrified_ him. Of course he didn't want to be the one to tell her what he had to tell her -she would hate him for it. But what else could he do? He had given his word that he would and the truth was that it should come from him. He had thought he would have a few days still to get ready, but apparently he had been wrong. Marian was not in Sussex. She was here, and in about two minutes he would have to tell her that the one she had been expecting was not coming back. How lovely.

And sure enough, after she had given him a tight embrace and assured him how happy she was to see him, she took a step back and glanced over their shoulders to the road they had evidently been following. When it became clear that no one else was coming, she fixed them both with a curious look and asked the question both men had been dreading.

“Where's everyone else?”

Allan had to try hard not to wince.

“Djaq decided she wanted to stay with her people. Will decided he wanted to stay with her,” he explained in a last-ditch attempt to stall for time.

“And _Robin_?,” she pressed.

Realising that something very bad had happened, John stepped closer to offer his support if it was needed. He met Allan's eye and in an instant he knew the truth.

Something very bad indeed.

“There was an ambush,” Much began, choosing his words carefully. He wanted Marian to know the whole story, but he also wanted to spare her as much pain as he could. There was no use in her knowing exactly how much pain her beloved had gone through. “Shortly after we arrived. Robin learned that Vaisey was working with others and they were trying to lure the king by promising to talk peace. So of course, Robin being Robin, he decided to take the king's place.”

Marian nodded once, all too familiar with Robin’s antics. Of course he would run towards danger, not shield himself from it. _Of course_.

“There was a fight,” Much continued. “The impostor was easily overpowered, but there was the Sheriff and Gisborne to take into account. We tried to get the king to safety –to Acre. But they followed us. Vaisey shot an arrow at him that fortunately missed his heart but got his shoulder nonetheless. He was thrown off his horse and Gisborne was to finish the job.”

The tension was palpable. Even Kate, confused as she still was, recognised the anxiety hanging in the air and didn’t dare interrupting.

“Robin was the closest by a long shot, since he was riding just behind the King. We had separated and we would have never made it in time. He saw Gisborne approaching, sword drawn, ready to deliver the fatal blow...”

“He was a bloody hero,” Allan added, knowing Much was having trouble recounting the events of that day. He knew that his words meant little now, but he wanted Marian to know nonetheless. She needed to know what Robin had done for England –for all of them. “To go after Gisborne, unarmed as he was (he’d used his sword on the fake Saladin and he didn’t think to retrieve it before he went after Vaisey)... He knew he didn’t stand a chance. But he saved him. Bought us enough time to get there and handle the situation. Gisborne escaped, but at least the King lived to fight another day.”

“And Robin?” Marian whispered hoarsely. Her voice sounded foreign to her own ears. She felt cold and detached from the world around her –for now, anyway. She idly wondered how long it would take for the pain to come, because at the moment she couldn’t feel anything.

“Djaq did _everything_ –you have to believe that. I’ve never seen anyone putting that much effort into anything. But the cut was too deep, and we were too far from the camp to get the right instruments... It was a rigged game from the start, but she fought tooth and nail to save him, he just...” Allan’s words came in a rush, eager to defend Djaq if he needed to. But he trailed off when he realized that Marian was not arguing with him, that she wasn’t demanding they tell her _exactly_ what their unofficial physician had done and failed to do in an effort to determine if there could have been a different outcome.

“Just say the words,” she said. “Say it and get it over with.”

Much took a deep breath before replying.

“He’s dead. Robin is dead.”

That was her undoing. Pain came so suddenly that her whole body quivered under its force. Her knees wobbled and she would have tumbled to the ground if John had not wrapped his strong arms around her waist and pulled her to his chest.

“No,” she whispered brokenly.

“I’m sorry, Marian,” Allan offered. “I’m _so_ sor-“

“No, he canno- he _cannot_ be dead.”

Much and Allan had been there as Robin took his last breaths, so their hearts had already been broken many weeks ago. But seeing Marian like this –strong, confident Marian, reduced to a whimpering mess in John’s arms- It made every little fragment shatter again.

John’s own heart was in pieces, but the necessity to comfort Marian was greater than his own pain. He’d given his word that he would take care of her and just because Robin had gone back on his word, it didn’t mean that he could too. There would be plenty of time to break down later. For now, though, John had to stay strong.

“I can’t believe that he’s doing this to me again,” Marian whispered, barely intelligibly between her sobs.

She had been sure, the first time he left for the Holy Land, that she would never see him again. She had told him as much when he came to say goodbye. He would leave, he would die and she would go on with her life. She wouldn’t look back _once_ on their relationship. If he left, he needn’t bother coming back, she had said. She had meant every word, or at least she had thought she had. One look at him when he finally returned, standing at her front porch and looking utterly bewildered at her, and she had realized how wrong she had been. Relief had flooded her and it was a long while later that she had managed to wipe the smile from her face. But for five years, she had used her anger as a shield and it had worked. Maybe if she had learned of his passing then, it would have worked too –perhaps it would have been only a _small_ buffer, but it certainly would have been better than nothing.

But “nothing” was all she got. Gone were the days where she could claim that Robin was an idiot, that he had left looking for glory, that he had given her up to go on a fool’s errand. This time, he had left trying to make things right. Marian could not fault him for that.

“You said he’d _promised_ to come back,” she said angrily, pushing against John’s chest and stepping away from his embrace, suddenly in no mood to be comforted. “You said he gave you his word that he wouldn’t go looking for trouble.”

“He did,” John admitted.

“And yet _here we are_ ,” she snarled, desperately calling upon every ounce of anger she could conjure within herself. “What business did he have taking the king’s place and going to meet a known impostor? He isn’t Richard’s soldier anymore,” she demanded. “His place is _here_ , he’s supposed to be _here_. He has to –he has to-”

She had been pacing, her breathing becoming more and more raged and her eyes filling with more and more tears. Her friends had allowed her this, admitting she needed to get her pain and anger out of her system, but when it became clear that her body was about to shut down, Much decided that enough was enough.

He stepped right in front of her, cutting into her path. He placed his hands on each of her shoulders, gently but firmly, holding her in place. He waited for a moment until she raised her eyes to meet him and then spoke in his most suiting tone.

“It hurts. I know it does. And you want to be angry because you think that if you’re angry it won’t hurt as much. But trust me, Marian, getting angry doesn’t solve anything.”

“I don’t know what else to do,” she admitted brokenly.

“Neither did I at first, but now I know. We have to do as he would: he died for England, so we have to _live_ for England. It is our duty as his friends to finish what he started.”

Marian stared blindly at him for a moment, her mind far, far away. She remembered with painful clarity that first night after he returned from the Holy Land, how angry he had been at the state he had found Nottingham in. She had called him a fool then, but she had been secretly glad at finding he cared and as he morphed into the saviour of the people –sacrificing everything in the name of what was good–, she had grown to admire him more and more.

Much was right. Even if on the inside she felt like dying, she couldn’t give up just yet. She had to carry on –for him if nothing else. She had to do what he could not. She had to live the life he had given up on for England.

 _“We find Lardner, we bring the King home and then we get married,”_ he had said a lifetime ago, in their special tree where he had attempted to propose by comparing her to his bow, next to a man they had just buried. Obviously it was too late now for the last part of that promise to come true and they had already achieved the first part. But they had never managed to bring the King back, even though Robin had given his last breath in that quest. It was up to her now –and whatever was left from the gang– to try. They would fight the Sheriff, they would hold Nottingham until the King returned. And then she would join him –but not until she had fulfilled his mission.

“You are right,” she agreed softly. “You’re right, that is exactly what we need to do.” She took a deep breath that cleared some of the fog inside her head. The pain was still there, a dull ache she imagined she would have to get used to for the rest of her days, but from the first time since she had seen Allan and Much, she could see a clear path in front of her. “Thanks, Much.”

“I’ll always be at your service, Marian. I’m sorry I couldn’t protect him.”

It was easier to push her pain out of the way when she was confronted with Much’s. He had loved Robin too, probably every bit as much as she had, and he had had to see him taking his last breath. Marian was slightly ashamed that it hadn’t occurred to her sooner that he was hurting too.

“You did, Much, you took care of him for years. I’m thankful he had you at the end, too, and I’m certain that he felt the same, even if he couldn’t say it,” she promised.

He gave her a bittersweet smile, clearly not convinced but thankful for her effort nonetheless.

“What do you say if we go back to the camp?” John proposed. “You must be tired and we have much to discuss.”

“Don't you have anything planned for this afternoon?,” Allan asked, unwilling to interrupt them in their usual routine. “Much and I can fend for ourselves-”

“We were going to have a look around Locksley, but it can wait till morning,” John assured them. “Right now we need to be at the camp.”

It was a solid plan, so they were all in agreement. The five of them made their way swiftly through Sherwood until they had reached the seemingly deserted clearing that housed their camp. Kate pulled on a hidden lever and suddenly they were home. It was only then that Allan and Much allowed themselves to finally relax.

“You still have your old places,” John informed them. “Kate and Luke have joined the gang, but we still fit.”

“It’s still six of us,” Much commented idly, his finger tracing the lid of Robin’s trunk, which sat at the very end of the camp, pushed against a wall so that it wasn’t in the way. “Different six, though.”

“Wait, who’s Luke?” Allan asked from his hammock –which, he was pleased to learn had not been removed when he had left to join Gisborne’s ranks. He supposed he had Djaq to thank for that, but he didn’t dare to ask. Robin’s absence was too heavy a burden already, there was no need to bring attention to more people they had lost.

“Scarlett,” Marian explained, sitting herself on Robin’s bunk – _hers_ now, not his– and removing her cloak and vest as she usually did when she was in the camp. Out in the forest and around the shire, she was known only as the Nightwatchman; only here could she be her real self. “Will’s brother. He came back a few weeks after you’d left and decided to stay in the gang. He’s in Nottingham now, so we should know if the Sheriff is back soon enough.”

They passed the time eating and drinking –Much and Allan had been travelling non-stop for days, eating only as little as they could get away with, so they were starving. They were also exhausted, so it wasn’t until his third mug of ale that it occurred to Much that he had yet to share one final thing with Marian.

“Oh!” he suddenly exclaimed, jumping to his feet and knocking several plates in the process. “I almost forgot, I have something for you.”

“For me?” Marian asked, watching as he raced to the mouth of the camp, where he had left the satchel he had been carrying.

He deposited the item in question on the table –avoiding to knock the beakers only because Allan had had the sense to remove them when he saw his intention– rummaged around it a bit until he finally produced three objects he placed reverently in front of Marian.

For a long moment the young woman could do nothing but stare at the three familiar pieces she had never thought she’d see again –at least not since she had learned that their previous owner was not coming back.

She reached out and slowly, carefully, traced the string of Robin’s bow, the same bow she had learned to shoot with. Once upon a time, this bow had been no different than any one of Robin’s limbs. The young lord had carried it wherever he went and rarely had he been seen without it.

Being presented with it now, so far away from where its master lay, was certainly odd, but strangely comforting. Robin might not be here, but a part of him was.

“He couldn’t be buried here, so he sent his weapons to be buried in his stead,” Much explained softly. “But it’s better if you have them, I think. So he’ll protect you, from wherever he is.”

Marian was only half listening, her attention now on Robin’s quiver, still filled with the arrows he alone used. He had always made his own, refusing even Much’s help. He had told her once that he had a special technique only he knew, and while Marian had never fully believed him, the truth was that the arrows made by his hand both looked and felt different for some reason. She had vowed to get the truth out of him, but it was one secret he had taken to his grave.

The last one of Much’s gifts sat on the table next to the quiver. Robin’s sword, the scimitar he had acquired from a traveler that had passed through Nottingham when he was twelve, sat next to his quiver. Marian still remembered how excited he had been, how much his eyes had shone when he met her at their clearing to show it to her. He had been eager to try it and had urged Marian to fight him. She had tried to comply, but she had been very young and ill-fitted to be his opponent. Fortunately for Robin, there had been someone else around eager to help him out.

“You know what,” she said suddenly, grabbing the sword by the hilt and pushing it into Much’s hand. “You should take this.”

The man was caught completely off guard and he could only stare at Marian with his jaw hanging open.

“W– What?” he finally choked out.

“You should take this,” she said again, more confidently this time. The more she thought about it, the more she knew she was making the right choice. “He tortured you with it for years, I can’t think of anyone who deserves this more than you.”

“I– I don’t know what to say.”

“Say you’ll use it as he would,” she told him. Then, addressing the others as well, she added. “There won’t be any meaningless bloodshed. The principles Robin stood for are the principles we shall stand for. We fight for the people, but we don’t kill for the people. There has already been enough death around here.”

“We are Robin Hood,” John held, raising his beaker in a toast.

“We are Robin Hood,” Marian agreed, nodding her head in acknowledgment.

Much wiped his tears furiously and joined in on the toast along with Allan.

Luke returned several hours later, just as it was starting to go dark and John and Marian were discussing whether someone should go and find him in case he had gotten himself in some kind of trouble.

“I’m sorry I’m so late, but I had to make sure that what people were saying around town was right,” he explained after he was told what had transpired in the camp in his absence.

“What were they saying around town?” John asked.

“That Vaisey and Gisborne are back,” Luke replied. “They are, by the way. I snuck into the castle and saw them myself. They have been back for at least a week, I think, but it doesn’t look as if they want word to get out.”

“Of course they wouldn’t,” Allan reasoned. “Not only have they travelled all the way to the Holy Land to commit treason, they also failed at it. I imagine the Vaisey’s friends are not too pleased with him these days.”

“Probably not, but he did get rid of Robin, so counts for something. Sorry,” John added, glancing towards Marian.

“He’s gone, we might as well get used to that,” she assured him, though her heart broke a little more every time she even thought about it. “But you’re right, Robin’s – _absence_ is something and Vaisey will want to milk it as much as he can,” she pondered.

“What are you thinking?” Allan asked curiously, recognising in her expression that Marian had already come up with a plan.

“We’ll show him that Robin Hood is not dead,” she stated simply.

Things would never be the same without Robin, but Marian was determined to make him proud.

Vaisey and Gisborne had no idea what was coming for them, she vowed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://writerladymarianne.blogspot.com.ar/


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've read this story before, you might remember that it used to be 10 chapters long. Also, if you read my AN before the original chapter three, you might also remember that I was toying with the idea of adding a chapter before that. I didn't though, because it wasn't done and because I was eager to get the story going. But I think it works, so I've decided to post it here after all. I really enjoyed writing it and I hope you'll enjoy reading it. Let me know what you think, will you?

**CHAPTER III.**

The death of one’s number one enemy should be a day of joy for anyone -and more so when one’s enemy is none other than the elusive Robin Hood. Sheriff Vaisey of Nottingham should be beyond pleased with himself.

And yet, for some reason, he was not.

It was not that he feared that Hood had somehow survived. Oh, no, not this time. Hood had fooled him before, so he had been extra careful this time around. You know, just as the saying goes: "fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice... you are not going to fool me twice because I'm not a gullible idiot." So Vaisey had checked. He had _personally_ returned to Acre on that very first night to make sure and he had sent people to the King’s camp to ask around the next day. He had even stayed in the Holy Land for a few more days longer than was necessary to be absolutely  _certain_ that Hood’s men had left –if their leader was still alive then surely they wouldn’t leave him there, he had reasoned, especially not that lapdog of his -Much, he thought his name was, or something equally ridiculous.

No, this time there was no possible mistake. Robin Hood was dead and gone.

And yet, for some reason, Vaisey was not at ease.

Hood’s death aside, the fact remained that they had failed in their mission. The King was still alive. And, worse yet, he was onto them. If he ever returned to England –and, judging by what he had heard and seen when he was in the desert, there was every chance he would be back before the year was over–, he would make it his first order of business to deal with the Black Knights in general and with Sheriff Vaisey of Nottingham in particular. They would have to think of a way to stop that from happening –fast.

Then again, he reflected, he wasn’t even certain there even _was_ a “they” anymore –at least not one that included him _and_ the Black Knights. After his last failure, they had made it quite clear that his position within the group was hanging by a thread. Vaisey -seeing that he wasn't a gullible idiot- was well aware of the fact that they only kept him around anymore was because they were planning on using him as a scapegoat, should the need for one arise.

No, it would appear as if it would be up to him to save his own skin. As usual.

The only question that remained was whether he could count on Gisborne for help.

Speaking of gullible idiots...

As if on cue, the man in question appeared at the gallery where Vaisey was standing, watching as the townspeople went about their business, completely unaware of the Black Nights or King Richard. The door he had just passed through banged against the back wall and closed shut from the force with which it had been pushed.

“Still haven’t found her?” Vaisey asked innocently, noticing at once the dark mood his lieutenant was in.

“No,” the man spat back, oblivious to the light humour in his boss’ voice. “She seems to have vanished from the face of the earth.”

“Oh, no. What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to find her. I don’t care if I have to torch down every convent and every abbey. I _will_ find her.”

The Sheriff shook his head, half amused, half annoyed at Gisborne’s obliviousness.

“You know there’s a chance –and I’m just putting this out there– that she doesn’t _want_ you to find her?”

Gisborne shot him a deadly glare.

“I don’t care.”

“Of course you don’t,” Vaisey muttered, waving his hand dismissively. Then, violently switching gears as he was wont to do when he felt exasperated, he continued: “Gisborne, wake up! She doesn’t love you, probably never did and _she doesn’t want to be with you_! Now stop whining! We have bigger things on our plate!”

The other man was slightly taken aback at the tone and blinked a few times in surprise.

“What things? Hood is dead. There’s nothing for us to worry about anymore.”

“Hood? You think this is about _Hood_ ? Come on, _keep up_! Nobody cares about him anymore. It’s the Black Knights I worry about!”

“The Black Knights?”

“Well, yes! The King is still alive, so as you can imagine, they are not too happy with us...”

“You mean with _you_.”

It was a few moments before Vaisey could grasp the meaning of Gisborne’s words.

“ _Excuse me_?” he hissed.

“They are not too happy _with you_. You were the one who promised them Richard’s head on a stick.”

“Oh, and I suppose you think that’s only _my_ problem? That they don’t think _you_ are as much at fault as _me_?”

“ _I killed Hood,_ ” Gisborne said, his eyes shining with an almost maniac glint. He took great pleasure in the fact that Hood was no more, all thanks to his sword. In Guy’s mind, Hood had been worse than King Richard himself and the fact that he was finally dead outshone everything else. Well, almost.

He had returned to Nottingham in an exceedingly good mood. He had killed Robin Hood and he had sort of prevented any kind of talks about peace between King Richard and Saladin for at least some time. Everything had gone relatively well. Now, he expected, he was in a position to marry Marian, claim Locksley for good and start a new life. He didn’t much care about Vaisey anymore. He knew the Black Knights would repay him for his services well enough. It would be sufficient for Marian.

But he hadn't found her when he returned, she had been gone. A guard –not the one who had been instructed to keep an eye on her; he had fled Nottingham weeks ago, knowing what kind of fate awaited him if he were to stay until Gisborne returned– had told him that she had disappeared a week or so after their departure. They had looked for her, he had assured him. They had even ventured deep into Sherwood, all to no avail. She had vanished from the face of the earth.

This, of course, was not something Gisborne would just _accept_. After punishing the guard severely for his companion’s uselessness, he had made it his personal mission to find the girl he wished to marry. Two weeks later, he was starting to lose his mind.

“La di da di da!” Vaisey said in a sing-song voice, breaking Gisborne from his thoughts. “Enough of that already. Hood was but a pebble in one’s boot. His death will mean nothing if Richard still makes it back to England!”

“He won’t. After the attack, he won’t be eager to talk peace anytime soon.”

“Maybe, maybe not. We _need_ to be ready for any eventuality. Richard cannot land on English soil again.”

“I will find Marian first,” Gisborne said resolutely, making Vaisey throw his hands up in exasperation. “I will find her, marry her and _then_ I will deal with the King. _In that order_.”

He turned to leave, probably in search of more soldiers to send to another convent.

“She’ll be the death of you, the pretty one,” Vaisey called after him. “Mark my words, Gisborne!”

Around the corner, two figures watched the whole scene and had to make great efforts not to intervene. One more so than the other.

“I can’t believe it!” Marian whispered. “What does he think? That after everything he’s done I will still marry him?” she continued, oblivious to John’s warnings that she should be quiet.

“Marian, shut up!”

She did. For a moment.

“I mean, even if he doesn’t know about the _Nightwatchman_ , he can’t possibly think I would be happy with him trying to kill King Richard! Does he even _know_ me?”

John was starting to regret bringing her here. Then again, it had been _her_ plan, so she would argue that she belonged here. Still, it couldn’t be easy for her to be back at Nottingham castle, standing so close to the man who had wronged her in so many ways. Marian was generally smart and collected, but she was known to act impulsively too, from time to time. Little John was beginning to fear that today would be one of those days when her worse qualities showed.

However, he needn’t have worried, for shortly after Guy’s departure, Vaisey decided he had had enough with watching the people and decided to leave in search of other activities. John and Marian waited for a few moments until they were sure he was out of earshot before either of them relaxed.

“You have to be more careful, Marian,” the man reminded her when they were alone. “You could have easily been overheard.”

“Well, what if I had?” she challenged. “I _wish_ they had heard me; I wish they had come after me!”

He placed his strong hands on the girl’s shoulders and firmly pinned her against the wall.

“Marian, _no_. This is precisely what we said you wouldn’t do when you first came to the camp.”

When he first went to see her after he returned to Nottingham from Portsmouth, John had suggested that Marian took some time and went to visit her family while Robin took care of things in the Holy Land, but she had made it abundantly clear that if he expected her to leave, he would have to forcefully remove her from the shire. So they had struck a deal: she would stay in the camp with him, but if he ever felt she was in any kind of danger -be that either physical danger or risk of her true identity being discovered (because no way would he allow her to remain as Lady Marian of Knighton)-, she was off.

Their arrangement had worked surprisingly well for quite some time. Marian had generally followed his lead and had proven to be more than useful as part of the gang. More importantly, her secret identity had remained a secret and no one had linked the Nightwatchman, the elusive figure who seemed to have taken permanent residence in the forest, to the missing lady yet.

It was only now that she was beginning to crack and John was starting to wonder if he would have to finally make good on the promise he had made all those months ago.

“Well, things change!” she spat.

“ _This_ didn’t!”

“Robin is _dead_ ,” she forced the word out of her mouth as if saying the words over and over again would make things easier. It didn't. Each time the word crossed her mind it tore another piece of her heart. It was a wonder there was still enough of her left to function, she thought.

John’s dark eyes softened slightly.

“I know,” he whispered gently. “But _you_ aren’t, and he would certainly not wish you to be. If the situation were reversed, you’d want him to live, wouldn’t you?”

Yes, of course, she would. Not that that thought made things any easier at the moment.

Learning that Robin was dead had been so shocking that at first, she hadn't even considered _why_ he was dead at all. It wasn't until the next day when she and the rest of the outlaws were discussing the best way to show Vaisey that while Robin of Locksley was no more, _Robin Hood_ was alive and kicking, thank you very much, that it had dawned on her.

 _Gisborne_.

Anger and guilt had coursed through her in equal measure. She had defended Guy when no one else had, she had convinced Robin to spare his life on more than one occasion and because of that, he was dead. Gisborne had killed him, and in a way, it was her fault.

So, even though she had promised herself that she would abide by Robin’s principles and she wouldn’t go killing people willy-nilly, she had decided that Gisborne was to be the exception to that rule.

She hadn’t had the chance to confront him yet. For a whole week after Much’s and Allan’s return they had seen neither hide nor hair of either man. If it hadn’t been for Luke, the outlaws wouldn’t have known that they were back.

But everything had changed a few days later. Kate and Much had been in Nottingham taking medicines to old Nellie, a former servant from Locksley that had recently relocated when they’d seen Vaisey finally emerging from his lair. Kate had told them (because Much had been too angry to talk) when they returned to the camp that from the steps of Nottingham Castle, the Sheriff had loudly proclaimed that Robin Hood had died in the Holy Land after failing to kill the king.

Marian had been plotting her revenge ever since.

Kate and Luke appeared then, their hands full of supplies.

“Got everything we need?” John asked them, thankful for the interruption. Perhaps with them there, Marian would decide against rushing after Gisborne at this very moment.

“Banners and ink, just as you asked,” Luke agreed.

Marian nodded and guided them to an empty room to carry on with their plan. John stood guard by the door as the three of them worked -she on one banner and the other two on the other. A few minutes later, they were done.

“You know what to do. Allan and Much should be in place. We’ll meet back at the camp,” the older woman said, rolling up her banner and placing it in Kate's hands.

The young people nodded and set out to meet with their friends. John and Marian waited for a few moments and then headed towards the courtyard.

“You don't have to babysit me,” she told him when they were in position and waiting for the others to do their part. Her friend rolled his eyes and didn't even bother to reply.

“That's Allan's signal,” he said a minute later, discreetly pointing at one of the towers from which window Allan had hanged the rolled-up banner and was now waving at them to call attention to himself.

“And that's Much,” she added looking at the other tower. “That's my cue.”

Ducking behind a wall so as not to be seen, she made quick work of removing her Nightwatchman’s cloak and revealing Robin's clothes she was wearing underneath. She kept her mask on and pulled her hood up, making sure that her whole face was covered.

“Get ready to run,” she warned John getting in position.

She picked one arrow and carefully set it in place. She was a good shot -Robin had taught her well- and this one was simple enough, but she was using Robin’s arrows, so she couldn't afford to miss. Also, she was trying to impersonate Robin Hood, arguably the best archer in the whole of England, -missing a shot like this one would have ruined their whole plan.

She didn't miss, though. Her arrow flew true and certain to its target and the banner rolled down along the wall of the tower. She repeated the process on the other one and allowed herself a moment to admire her handiwork.

But a moment was all she got because that's when she was spotted.

“Robin Hood!” cried one of the guards.

“Run!” Marian ordered John.

They did and they were outside of Nottingham in no time, but not before they had attracted the attention of the crowd, who quickly began whispering among themselves and pointing towards the castle.

Hearing the commotion from outside, Vaisey decided to see what was happening and stuck his head out of a window. He saw some peasants looking up at the castle in awe, so he followed their gaze. What he saw made his blood run cold in his veins.

Hanging from each of the towers at the front of the castle was one of the banners that were put up for special occasions. That was odd enough because the sheriff had certainly not ordered such decorations. But the truly terrifying part was the words that someone had written across them.

**ROBIN HOOD IS NOT DEAD**

Vaisey could only stare for a _long_ moment, too stunned to even think. It didn't matter that most people couldn't read, the first two words were familiar enough and that was all anyone would care about -hell, it was all _he_ cared about!

“ _GISBORNE_ ,” he called at last, disappearing back into the castle. He didn't know what his lieutenant was doing, but it would have to wait. _T_ _his_ took precedence. They had to figure out what the hell was going on.

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://writerladymarianne.blogspot.com.ar/


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is one of my favourite chapters, so I decided to post it a little earlier than usual. I hope you'll like it too. (Spoiler alert, you will).
> 
> Thank you all for the continuous love and support. It means the world to me.

**CHAPTER IV.**

Green.

Everything was green. The grass was green. The trees were green –barks and all. Even the sky had a certain greenish undertone that he hadn’t seen anywhere but here.

To Robin of Locksley, green was the most wonderful colour in the entire world.

Green was life. Green was freedom.

Green was _home_.

He had landed in England two weeks ago and had spent most of the time since making his way up north, avoiding towns and popular roads alike, changing courses frequently in the off chance that he was being followed. It had taken him a long while -much more than he would have liked under any other circumstances-, but it had worked, since he was confident that no living soul outside his little party had any idea that he was alive -let alone that he was _here_ -, and that was the whole point of this endeavour.

He had arrived in Sherwood two days ago and that was when things had gotten harder for him.

 _So close_ , he thought now, just as he had thought upon seeing the first trees of the forest. He was so close and yet so terribly far still.

He had set his camp in a cave near Clum -a risk, since it was a well-known spot both by the outlaws that inhabited the forest and the soldiers that guarded the shire, but a calculated one. It was unlikely the outlaws would have any reason to visit, as they usually preferred other roads that were less exposed and the soldiers were generally so unobservant that they wouldn’t notice any traces they might leave. Besides, while getting caught was not exactly desirable, it wouldn’t be the worst either. The soldiers he could deal with easily enough and the outlaws… Well, the outlaws were another story entirely.

He had traced an imaginary line inside his head. The point of no-return, he had called it. It was the closest he could bear to be to the path that would take him directly into their camp. Any closer and he wouldn’t be able to stop himself. One step would lead to another, and then another and before he knew it he would be on his hands and knees begging for forgiveness and that _would be_ very bad.

He had another matter to deal with before that.

But though he wasn’t there physically -he was standing right at the edge of that line, just as he had been for the better part of the last two days-, his thoughts were with them.

He smiled fondly as he pictured them with his mind’s eyes, sitting together in that little clearing where they had set up camp two years ago, talking about the events of the day and coming up with new ways to further annoy Sheriff Vaisey, completely oblivious to the monumental surprise they were about to get in a few days’ time.

Not for the first time, Robin cursed his need to always be a good soldier. If he had kept his mouth shut, there was every chance that he would be there now. His companions wouldn’t have thought much about the outlaws and they would have certainly been caught by now. But Robin _had_ known about them and he had also known _why_ they couldn’t afford to be found out: their mission was “complicated” to say the least, and they didn’t have much going on for them. Their best chance was to take everybody by surprise, and sadly for him, that included Robin Hood’s men, much as it tore him apart to even think about it. And so it had been his duty to speak up and propose this alternative plan of action.

Still, it was in moments that this, when he was alone with his thoughts, that he wanted nothing more than to throw caution to the wind and run. Run and run and run and then...

Be home.

He wanted desperately to go home.

The woman moved lightly, and if he hadn’t been half expecting her, he might not have heard her.

“I’m not going to go running to them,” he said without turning, guessing that she had come to check on him. He may have fooled a lot of people, but he had never fooled her. From the moment they met, she had seen all of him, even the parts he hadn’t planned to show. She could read him like a book –she was actually one of the few who could.

“I know you’re not,” she replied matter of factly. It was precisely because she knew him that she was confident that he would eventually do what was best for those under his protection. It was one of the reasons why he had left in the first place. “It was you who said it would be a bad idea to draw attention to ourselves when we are so close to home.”

He closed his eyes, marvelling at the sound of that simple word out loud. _Home_ , he was actually coming home.

During the weeks and months of his fight against the most vicious enemy he had ever had to fight, he had come to fear that he would never make it back. There had been times when drawing a simple breath had been a struggle, and he had wondered during those times if this was a trouble he couldn't get himself out of. For the first time since he could remember, neither his body nor his mind had felt like putting up a fight and had yearned for the sweet relief of death. Every inch of him had hurt and he had felt a fire spreading from somewhere down his middle section in every direction. Giving up then would have been so easy...

But he hadn’t given up. The memories of what he had left behind –of the trees and the ponds, of his friends and family, of all the promises he had made and never lived up to- had kept him grounded. The few hours that weren’t spent in agony were filled with images of his whole life flashing before his eyes and they had given him the strength he needed.

And so he had fought.

He had fought against the pain.

He had fought against the fever and infection.

He had fought against the odds stacked against him.

He had fought against his own terror of what he would find, should he ever be strong enough to return.

He had fought. And he had won.

He had survived.

And now here he was.

 _Home_.

Well, almost.

“Why are you here then, if not to remind me of the risks of yielding to my most dangerous desires, Djaq?”

“I thought you would appreciate the company,” she replied, coming to stand next to him. “Sometimes it’s good to talk about what it is that is bothering you, so your good friend can tell you that you’re being ridiculous.”

He rolled his eyes and kept his sight straight ahead.

“I’m not being ridiculous,” he snorted. He had every right to be worried. In fact, he would argue he was taking the whole thing rather well, all things considered...

“You’re thinking that maybe they aren’t there anymore –you’re being ridiculous,” she replied petulantly, showing once again her uncanny ability to read what other people were thinking.

She was right, of course. That was exactly what he was thinking –at least on some level.

The question of what he would find when - _if_ \- he returned was one that had been tormenting him for weeks now. He had been away for so long and the circumstances under which he had left had been so dire that there was every chance that he no longer had a home to go back to –a family to welcome him back.

“You can’t be sure,” he reminded her through gritted teeth, hoping against hope that she couldn’t see the extent of his heartache.

“I suppose you’re right. Maybe Vaisey has had a sudden change of heart and pardoned them for all their crimes,” she said, pretending to consider his words.

“They can be dead,” he argued, ignoring her humour.

“Even less likely. In case you have forgotten, it was usually _you_ who got in trouble and _us_ who had to rush to save your ass. If anything, I dare say they are safer now.”

He smiled despite himself. She did have a point...

“Still, things change. Like it or not, we have to be ready for the possibility of them being gone,” he said firmly, forcing the words out of his mouth.

Djaq grunted in exasperation and spun so that she was facing her friend.

“You survived a wound that could have been fatal –that _should_ have been fatal. You made it through a trip that killed many men stronger than yourself. It’s _okay_ to be hopeful, you know?” she reasoned, once again reading between the lines for the true source of his discomfort.

“I’ve tried being hopeful before. It didn’t work out.”

The Saracen was a little amused at his stubbornness, but she was mostly annoyed. For months she had watched him sulking, obstinately refusing to even _consider_ that the worst part was over, that whatever may come, he would deal with surrounded by his people, with his friends. That he was _alive_ and that that was a good thing, regardless of everything else.

“Listen, I could live with your dark mood on the ship because I thought you were scared. A million things could have still gone wrong, but they _didn't,_ ” she snapped, grabbing him by the shoulders and tugging until he met her eyes. “This has got to stop now. Things _didn't_ go wrong;  you _are_ here. You are _alive_ . You brought your King back and you’re about to defeat your enemy. You have friends that will be over the moon to see you. You have a woman who has already agreed to marry you who will be –,” she wanted to tell him that the woman he loved would be so pleased to see him that she wouldn’t care that she had thought him dead for the past several months, but she knew her well enough to suspect that that would not be the case. “Well, she will probably be furious at you, but she will be relieved too, I imagine. It’s _okay_ to be happy!”

Robin almost snorted as he heard her mention the woman he loved. If there was _one person_ who wouldn’t be at all pleased with his sudden reappearance, that was her. He should know: this wasn’t the first time that he was coming back from the dead.

But Djaq’s words did bring back others. Words he had uttered a long time ago –a whole lifetime ago.

 _“We find Lardner, we bring the King home and then we’ll get married_ , _”_ he had said confidently. Everything had seemed so simple then. Could he dare to believe that everything would be that simple now?

No, he couldn’t.

Things were never simple for the two of them.

“Let’s agree to disagree,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest and looking away into the forest, effectively putting an end to their argument.

The woman rolled her eyes again and muttered some kind of curse in her native Arabic, though he knew it was said with affection rather than actual anger.

“Was there anything else you wanted?” he asked a while later, when he realised that instead of going back to the cave she had opted to stay next to him.

“Not really. I just needed to get out of that cave. I was beginning to feel rather claustrophobic with all your friends there.”

He looked down at her a little more fondly this time. She was here for him, after all. Whatever may happen in the next few days, he still had her by his side and that alone should have prevented him from being too harsh on her. He really couldn’t afford to alienate any more of his friends, he reminded himself.

He relaxed his stance and wrapped one arm around her shoulders, pulling her close to him.

“I’m sorry you have to go through this. I feel as if I’m the reason why you couldn’t stay in your home.”

“Oh, don’t flatter yourself,” she told him with a smile. “I already knew I would be coming back before it was even a possibility for you. I will admit, though, it has been easier this way. It’s almost been worth putting up with your dark mood.”

This information surprised him, and he frowned as he asked:

“What about your family? I thought you were excited to be back with them.”

“You are my family now –and the lads. _This_ ,” she made a wide, encompassing gesture of the forest around them “is where I belong. I don’t know why I ever thought different, I could have saved Allan and Much some of their heartache. Then again, I _did_ save your life, so maybe it’s a good thing I decided to give the desert a try, wouldn’t you agree?”

Robin looked down at his belly, where he could clearly feel his scar throbbing. It didn’t hurt anymore, but it still was  a constant reminder of the events of several months past.

“Yeah, probably,” he agreed with a small smile.

Footsteps were suddenly heard and they both turned in time to see their dear friend and travel companion making his way towards them.

“There you are! I’ve been looking all over for you. For a moment I thought...” said Will Scarlett.

“I wasn’t going to go into the Forest,” Robin complained loudly, knowing at once what Will was about to say. Honestly, did people think he was _that_ stupid? He did have _some_ measure of self control, after all.

The young man ignored him and addressed the woman at his side, brows frowned in confusion.

“He’s still in a bad mood? Shouldn’t that be over by now? He _is_ home, after all...”

Djaq shrugged, but she was smiling widely at him.

“You two are a match made in heaven,” Robin muttered mostly to himself, though this too was said with affection. Will and Djaq were his family -the only he had for the moment- and even though there were times when they annoyed him to no end, he was grateful for their presence.

“I was only joking, I never doubted your abilities to stick to a plan you yourself designed. I was actually looking for you because you're being summoned. Our _friend_ wants to go over the plan again.”

This immediately lightened Robin’s mood. Worried as he was, he was a soldier at his core, and soldiers _need_ to be doing something. The last couple of days spent in the utmost secrecy in that godforsaken cave, with nothing to do but think, had been almost as nerve-wracking as the weeks preceding it, spent idly on the ship that was bringing them across the sea. Even though he had gone over the plan time and time again, he didn't mind going over it again, just for the sake of having something else to focus his mind on.

“See, things are looking up already!” Djaq told him, noticing his sudden change in humour. He promptly ignored her and started making his way back to the camp, his two friends following closely behind.

They found the man they were looking for in the corner he had claimed as his own, bent over some maps and letters as he was wont to do in his spare time. He looked up when he heard them approaching.   

“Oh, there you are,” he said with the familiarity born from months spent in close proximity. Their difference in rank hardly meant a thing anymore, partly due to the amount of time they had spent together but specially because  marching on with all the pomp and circumstance fit for a King would have defeated the whole purpose of their journey. The three friends took a seat across him on the ground as he instructed them and waited for Richard to say what he had to say. “I wanted to go over everything with you one more time. The time is drawing close, and I would really prefer if things went smoothly. We don’t exactly have the upper hand when it comes to quantity of soldiers,” he gestured around the cave, where only six people besides the four of them –all of them handpicked by King Richard himself, both for their loyalty and their skills– were scattered around, providing both protection and privacy at the same time.

“We are few but we are unexpected. That counts for a lot,” Robin said calmly. “Half of Vaisey’s guards will be too stunned to do much damage and I’m pretty certain at least a few of them still have some sort of moral compass that will prevent them from attacking their own King. Numbers shouldn’t be a problem,” he reasoned.

“What do you anticipate _can_ be a problem?”

“Gisborne. He’s unpredictable under the best of circumstances. When he realises...” he paused, distracted by the image of Guy’s face when they _finally_ made it to Nottingham. He must be so sure of himself right about now, Robin thought. He wouldn't be so sure of himself in just a few short days. “Well, he won’t be thinking straight, and that could be dangerous.”

“And the Sheriff?”

“It will depend. If he senses he’s losing the upper hand, he’ll probably try to cut his losses and pin everything on someone else –possibly Gisborne. But he won’t go down without a fight, so I suggest you instruct your men to focus first and foremost on him. I’ll handle Gisborne.” He had tried to come across as calmed and collected and he had been more or less successful. But his hatred of Gisborne ran deep and it showed on both his tone and in the dangerous glint in his eyes.

“Very well,” said Richard, choosing to ignore his tone for the time being. “I’ve gotten word that a ship with fifty of our men has recently docked at York. They should be arriving in Nottinghamshire in two days time through the north. That is to say, Saturday in the afternoon.”

“On Sunday morning,” Robin continued, taking over. “-once we’re certain that they are in position, you will make your entrance. The courtyard is always pretty full on Sundays of people that go to Nottingham from all over the shire for mass. There will be an audience, which is actually kind of perfect,” he added with glee.

The more people knew the truth, the harder it would be for Vaisey to escape. And the sooner all of this would be over.

“Ideally, the Sheriff will surrender the town then and there. If, however, that is not the case –and you’re pretty adamant that he will put up a fight– we will signal our friends and they will come to help. Is that correct?”

“Yes, that’s exactly what we’ve talked about.”

The King nodded and looked down at his documents once again, deep in thought. Robin waited. Over the years under his service, he had forged a close relationship with the King of England, so close, in fact, that he had come to know him almost as well as he knew himself. That’s how he picked up on the fact that the sovereign wasn’t entirely pleased with the whole plan. And so he waited for him to say something, ready to put his mind at ease.

“Listen, you know I trust you,” he said at last, looking up from his documents and fixing him with a look that was partly apologetical and partly critical. “You’ve given me more than ample proof of your loyalty. But I still have to ask. Sixty men in nowhere near enough force to take down a Sheriff, especially not one as cunning as this one seems to be. Are you sure you are thinking with your head and not your heart? Because I _know_ what it feels like being away from home, but I need to make sure that you understand that the stakes are much higher than your own personal wishes. If you say you’re sure, I’ll believe you. But bear in mind that there’s another ship coming, which should be here in a couple of weeks. I ask of you to be honest with yourself: do you really think sixty men are going to be enough or wouldn’t we be better off waiting until our numbers were a little bit more respectable?”

Robin was slightly offended that his motives were suspected. After all, he had as much on the line as everyone else here –possibly more so. This was _his_ town, these were _his_ people. This was, in short, _his_ fight. So of course he was ready. He was _so_ ready.

He knew better than to complain out loud, fearing his confidence would be mistaken with cockiness. It had happened before, and the last thing he wanted was the King to have a sudden change of heart because of him. So he tried to explain, as calmly and as rationally as he was capable of, what in his mind was already very clear.

“Like I said, were we sixty men or six hundred, it’s not going to make a difference because at the end of the day it’s not going to be our numbers that will make the Sheriff surrender. I don’t even think there’s going to be much of a fight, and even if there was, sixty of the King’s men are more than capable of taking down Vaisey’s whole army –they are not trained as we are; they don’t really stand a chance. Besides, we are already too close to Nottingham and every moment we spend in the little cave we risk getting caught. At this point, I think turning back would do more harm than good.”

The King listened to him in silence and nodded his head in approval when he was done. He really trusted his young commander –one of the reasons why he had held off the trip until he could join them– and if he was being overly cautious it was because he knew of the man’s tendencies to act impulsively and wanted to make sure this was not one of those cases.

If there was one man in the whole wide world who deserved a happy ending, that was Robin of Locksley. King Richard wanted to make sure he got it. It was the least he could do for the young man who had saved his life twice now.

“Very well. If you’re sure then...”

“I am,” he paused for a moment considering an idea he had been pondering over for a few days now. This seemed like a good time to bring it up. “If, however, you’re still uneasy, there’s something else I would like to run by you.”

The King looked curiously up at him. He knew that the young nobleman’s ideas, though sometimes a little unorthodox, generally worked for the better.

“You have my attention,” he said.

“My men,” the young man stated simply. Behind him, Will shifted uncomfortably in his seat, but Djaq snickered. Of course Robin would bring this up -it was strange that he had waited so long to do so. “They can help us out.”

“I doubt three men are going to make much difference,” the King reasoned kindly.

The young man leaned forward, his green eyes sparkling with excitement as they always did when he talked about his friends.

“It’s not just _any_ three men. They know Nottingham better than anyone here –they could provide us with a way out, should we need one. At the same time, Vaisey is not going to be able to make a run for it if he has the Outlaws after him. They are exceptional fighters, and as you said we could use some more soldiers. Besides,” he added, getting to the real reason behind his sudden plea, “-they’ve devoted the last three years of their lives to this cause. They should be there to see it through the end.” Learning that their three friends -one of whom was supposed to be _dead,_ mind you- were back on English soil and hadn’t bothered to let them know was going to be shocking enough for the outlaws. If they were also to learn that their King was back and that he had dealt with Vaisey and Gisborne on his own, Robin didn’t think that John, Much and Allan would ever forgive them. They had sacrificed more than anyone else for King Richard, they deserved to be there in the end.

Richard the Lionheart thought about what the man had said for a long while. Sensing his conflict, one of the men closest to him leaned forward and whispered:

“Surely, your majesty, you cannot be considering...”

“Actually, I think I am.”

“But they are outlaws!”

“Who are probably more loyal to me than half of my so-called nobles,” the king reasoned. They had travelled to the Holy Land to warn him about the plans to assassinate him. How many of his nobles had done that? England was a different place than the one he had left so many years ago and he would have to be extra careful around some of his supposed friends. But the outlaws loyalties were not in question -they had _never_ been in question. “Okay, you win. How do you suggest we tell them?”

Robin smiled, relieved. They would be there, so that was one less problem to worry about. They would deal with Vaisey and Gisborne together and then they would _all_ go home. _Together_.

“Djaq can go,” Will replied from behind him, stealing the words right from his mouth. They were both eager to get her out of the way of the English soldiers for a while. Though they had acted civilly enough around her when King Richard was nearby, the fact that she was a woman and a Saracen had them a little on edge and after months of travelling in close quarters, that uneasiness was starting to morph into something potentially more dangerous. Getting her out of the way for a few days was the best they could do under the present circumstances, though Robin would have prefered to fight each and every man who dared suggest that his friend was not good enough to be around them. The knight seemed even more upset than he’d been before, but wisely chose not to say anything, lest the King take offence at his impertinence.

“Very well. Tomorrow at first light, Djaq shall go to the Outlaws’ camp and let them know of our plan. You shall stay with them all through Saturday to make sure they carry on their customary tasks as usual. Vaisey mustn’t suspect a thing. On Sunday morning, you will go with them to the courtyard, where you will wait for us.”

Djaq nodded her head politely.

“Okay, then. You should all get some rest now. We have a couple of intense days waiting for us.”

With those words, the three friends took leave from the King and went back to the spot where they had stood a few hours ago. It had been a beautiful day and it was shaping out to be a beautiful night. There were no clouds in the sky as the sun made its slow descend, casting everything around with its orange glow.

They sat together against one of the trees, just behind Robin’s point of no return, enjoying the familiar feel of Sherwood Forest around them.

“What should I tell them?” Djaq asked after a while. Her eyes were on Robin, but his were not on hers. He was gazing into the horizon, his heart and soul calling out to the friends who had no idea that he was here, yearning for them.

“Tell them that the King is back and that he needs their help. Also, tell them to blend in with the people in the courtyard, but not to go out of their way to do so. It would actually be good if Vaisey saw them there –he’ll be distracted and won’t expect us,” the man replied, automatically jumping into planning mode.

“That’s not what I meant,” the woman explained softly. “I meant about _you_. Should I tell them Robin Hood is alive?”

He thought about it for a moment. Though a large part of him wished to have the weight of his apparent death lifted from his shoulder, it was true that he couldn’t tell them –not yet.

He thought of Much, his most trusted friend and ally. He had been there to watch him take his last breath, his heart breaking at the prospect of having to go on without him.

He thought of Allan, who he had forgiven but abandoned with men who didn’t trust him anymore.

He thought of John, to whom he had entrusted the difficult task of being Robin Hood.

They had moved on, hopefully. They had lived their lives for months as best as they could and they were about to have their entire world shifted once again. How could he expect to drop such a bomb on them and ask them not to react for two whole days -or maybe more?

He couldn’t.

“No,” he sighed. “Not yet.” And then, forcing himself to be light and carefree and all-in-all Robin, he added:  “I think the shock of seeing you again is going to be enough for one day. They’ll learn the truth on Sunday, along with everyone else.”

Djaq accepted his efforts and wisely chose not call him out on how forced he clearly sounded. Will even went one step further.

“You have to go for the drama, don’t you?” he commented happily, which brought a small but more sincere smile to his friend’s face.

The night dragged. They didn’t go back to the cave and didn’t sleep either, though it was true that they really ought to be well rested before Sunday, but they were too excited to close their eyes. Just before dawn, Djaq deemed it clear enough to start her journey.

She gave Will a light peck on the lips and received a tight hug from Robin, who imagined himself hugging each and every one of his friends in that one embrace.

“You are still healing, so remember: get plenty of rest and don’t strain yourself. You will need all your strength on Sunday,” she reminded him sternly. She was excited to go back to see her friends, but she was worried for Robin too. Ideally, she would have prefered that he got a few more weeks of bed rest, but she knew that that was not going to happen. He had given her as much time as he was capable of -he couldn’t wait anymore; he _needed_ to get things over with once and for all.

“I will,” he promised her.

“And no archery!”

“Didn’t you say only yesterday that everything would be okay and that I should be excited to be home?” he asked mockingly.

“You know what I mean, Robin.”

“Yes, I know what you mean,” he admitted. “But trust me, Djaq. I haven’t gone through all the trouble of coming back from the dead only to die now that things are getting interesting,” he promised her, smiling cheekily.

“Yeah, I suppose you wouldn’t,” she agreed. “But be careful, will you? You have to look your best on Sunday,” she pleaded.

“You have my word, Djaq, and as John will be able to tell you on Sunday, I always keep my words.”

Djaq was laughing as she walked away, her steps light and carefree. Robin watched her for a long while, even as she was out of view.

“I’ll see you on Sunday,” he whispered at last, and with that he followed Will back into the cave.

It would be over soon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> http://writerladymarianne.blogspot.com.ar


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good morning all! How are we doing after the emotional roller-coster that was chapter 4? All good? Good, I'm glad.
> 
> It has been pointed out to me that some of you are having trouble keeping up with me and would prefer if I updated once every two weeks. I don't want anyone to feel preassured to read this in a rush, so please, take your time. I want you to enjoy this story, and if you read two chapters together and review only one of them, so be it. I won't get offended. But I want to know what the rest of you think. If the majority of readers want me to pace myself, then I'll be happy to oblige, but I want it to be as democratic as it can be. Let me know when you review, will you?
> 
> You should also know that I've come up with my next project, so the sooner I'm done with this, the sooner I can focus on that. (After the World Cup, that is -I'm a huge football fan, so don't expect more than the bare minimum from me for the duration of my country's stay on it).
> 
> Thanks all for reading and reviewing. You will never know what your support means to me.

**CHAPTER V.**

Djaq moved swiftly along the familiar paths, her smile growing wider every time her eyes found a new trap. Though unlike Robin she had never once doubted their friends’ ability to carry on without them, she had to admit that finding hard proof of their latest endeavours was a relief. 

She had missed them dearly. 

Looking back, she was a little surprised that she had ever thought she didn’t belong here. Sherwood was everything the desert was not: Sherwood was life, Sherwood was diversity, Sherwood was freedom.

It was ironic that she had had to get here to be sold as a slave. 

She had to admit that her first stay on English soil had been much more pleasant than she had thought it would be. Of course that was in no small part due to the friends she had made along the way. Fighting alongside Robin and his outlaws, she had felt like she was a part of something bigger for the first time since her father’s death. But a nagging feeling had been a constant at the back of her mind, reminding her time and time again that this was not her place. 

When the opportunity to go back home had presented itself, she had taken it without hesitation. 

She hadn’t been in Acre for all of two weeks before the feeling of uneasiness returned, louder now than it had ever been.

Because, she had soon realised, she didn’t belong here anymore. This was Safiya’s place and she wasn’t Safiya anymore. She was Djaq, and Djaq belonged in the forest. 

Djaq was part of Robin Hood. 

Will’s expression of relief as she told him she wanted to go back had possibly been one of the funniest things she had ever seen. He would have stayed for her, but he clearly missed his home. 

And so did she.

She soon reached the clearing that housed their camp. She knew that if she were to pull on the concealed lever that opened their door, chaos would ensue. The outlaws must be deeply asleep, in no way expecting company and much less hers. But she couldn’t simply wait there till they saw it fit to leave for the day. Fortunately for her, she didn’t need to. 

Will had confessed to her a few weeks ago that upon realising that Allan had betrayed them, he had decided that their camp needed an emergency exit, lest  their former friend yield to Gisborne’s persuasion and give them away. He had worked alone and hadn’t gotten around to telling anyone about it, so now their camp had a second exit that no-one but the two of them knew about. She could make her way in and no-one would hear her coming. Convenient, Djaq thought. 

The opening was well-hidden and barely big enough for a person to pass through it. Small and slight, Djaq managed quite well, but she doubted some of her friends -namely  _ John _ \- would find it as easy, so it was lucky that they had never had to use it.

She emerged into the camp right behind Allan’s hammock and for the first time in many months she felt at home. She took her time taking everything in. Everything was exactly how she remembered it. Much slept on his stomach, one arm dangling over the edge of his cot and soft snores barely muffled by his pillow. John slept on his side, which reminded Djaq of some kind of over-sized baby, as it had always done. Allan was on his hammock, arms wrapped tightly around his torso and his handsome face utterly relaxed. They were the same and they were there. 

_ Finally _ , after everything she had gone through, Djaq was where she belonged. 

Her face broke into a big smile as she imagined what would happen in just a short while. They would be waking up soon -as much as they trusted the protection provided by the camp and the alarm system surrounding it, they were still outlaws, so their days started early. She wondered who would spot her first. Probably Much, but maybe it was John. Or perhaps Allan had taken to waking up earlier lately. She didn’t know what life had been like for them in her absence. A lot of things could be different. 

Whatever the case may be, one thing was certain: they would  _ all _ be surprised to see her. Not only was she back, but she was back relatively soon. She had left Sherwood less than a year ago, had been in the desert for a couple of months and now she was here again. Even if some of them had hoped that she would return eventually, there was no way they could have imagined that it would be this early. 

Much and Allan had been surprisingly supportive when she informed them of her decision to stay in Acre. Then again, they had had some warning. Robin had guessed she wouldn’t be coming back even before they left England and had talked to her about it occasionally on the ship as they made their way. The others had heard too, and while they hadn’t been particularly happy about it and hoped she would changed her mind (especially Much, who hated the idea of breaking the gang up), when the time came, they accepted her decision with no complains. 

Besides, neither of them had had the heart to fight about anything.

Those first days in Acre after Robin’s death had been hard on everyone. They stayed the first night at the King’s camp –their half-felt complains hadn’t been heard at the time; the King was determined to keep an eye on them, the least he could do after everything they had gone through, he had told them. They had managed to leave for Bassan’s the following morning, intending to stay for a few days until they could sort things out. Much, however, couldn’t even make it through the first night. He wanted to leave, he had told them; he couldn’t be there anymore. He hated everything about that place –the sand, the heat. He hated that Gisborne was probably already on his way back to England. He hated that they had come here at all when they first did and even more than he had come back again. 

But most of all he hated Robin.

He loathed that Robin had still tried to save Richard, even after he had left them in the desert to die. He hated that his master had lost his sword fighting one of Vaisey’s allies and that in his rush to get to the King before the Sheriff got to him he hadn’t bothered to pick it back up. He despised himself for not being there for Robin, like he  _ should have been _ . For not helping him when he needed him. 

He hated that he was dead. 

He had died and Much really couldn’t stay there for another minute because if he did, he would go back to the desert, dig Robin up and he would kill him again. That’s how angry he was.

He had left with Allan the very next day. 

Neither Will nor Djaq had done much better, but she at least had taken some comfort in the company of her own people and he in hers. Still, the news brought by Bassan some days later that Richard’s men were looking for them had been a welcomed distraction.

They would be furious at her when they learnt that she had let them believe Robin to be dead for this long, but really, it wasn’t as if she had had a choice. They had tried to reach them before they left, but they had been long gone by the time Will made it to the port. Also, it wasn’t as if she had really held any real hope that Robin would recover –not until his fever broke several weeks later. She had told herself that giving them false hope would be much worse than keeping the truth from them; that she couldn’t let Much believe for even a second that  _ maybe _ not everything was lost yet. Robin would still probably die and Much and Allan would never need to know about the pain he had really gone through. No, it would be her burden to carry –and Will’s. 

But Robin had not died. He had survived and he had come back home.

And now Djaq would have to tell them the truth.

It wasn’t that she was disappointed or anything like that. The fact that Robin was alive was a sheer miracle and she couldn’t wait for the world to know about it. She didn’t regret her actions either –losing Robin once was bad enough, losing him twice would have been irreparable and she was glad that her friends hadn’t had to face that prospect. Still, it was one thing to be in the right and a whole other to make people  _ understand _ that one is in the right. Robin would vouch for that. Many months of his life had been spent trying to sway Marian to see things his way. Much certainly would argue against her as much as Marian ever did. And Allan wouldn’t be too happy either.

Maybe she could attempt to cook them breakfast as a sign of goodwill? It would be nowhere near enough to make up for all the months of heartache (especially with her skills in the kitchen), but the thought ought to count for something, right?

She had made up half her mind when her eyes turned instinctively to her old bunk and was shocked to find a petite figure lying on top of it. She looked at Will’s and, sure enough, there was a man sleeping there too. 

It took her a moment to understand what this meant: not only was Robin Hood still standing, they were also going strong -they were even recruiting people. 

The original Robin Hood would be proud. 

And speaking of the original Robin Hood...

She wasn’t as surprised to find the woman sleeping on Robin’s old bunk as she was annoyed at herself for not thinking of the possibility that she might be there. Lady Marian was not one to stay in the sidelines while everyone else risked their lives for a cause she believed in, so of course she wouldn’t have gone to Sussex or wherever it was she was supposed to have gone. Djaq should have known better. 

_ Robin _ should have known better. 

He had been surprisingly quiet on the subject of Marian ever since waking up from his fever. He had told them as he lay dying that she was in Sussex with her family, and not a lot more. 

He had tried not to talk much about what he would find when he came back to England, but even though he had occasionally mentioned the outlaws, he had not once mentioned her. Djaq had figured it was because he didn't want to get ahead of himself, but she hadn't been able to confirm her suspicion.

If that were the case, she had found that she couldn’t really blame him. Ensuing the King’s safe return was quite the task in itself. Adding the fact that he would also have to announce his revival in front of the better part of Nottingham, and one could see that Robin had quite a lot on his plate already. It was understandable that he didn’t want to think about Marian too -not that his friend believed for one second that he hadn’t thought about her. Robin might not have mentioned her, but his betrothed was most certainly on his mind. Djaq would wagger her life on that. 

The woman frowned when she pictured the fit the young nobleman would certainly throw when he learned that despite his best efforts,  the woman he loved had remained smacked in the middle of the fight, risking her life in  _ his _ name. If Djaq had held any hope of Robin's usual cheerfulness returning any time soon, it was gone now.  

At least Marian had had the sense to conceal her true identity, if the Nightwatchman's mask lying on top of the table was any indication. That was something, Djaq thought. It meant that she had  _ probably  _ not gone around taunting Gisborne and Vaisey and also that she had a back-up plan to fall back on if things got too dire in Sherwood. Surely Robin would appreciate that -when he started thinking clearly after the shock was over.

But Djaq couldn't focus solely on Marian. Not yet, anyway. She had three men to surprise first.

She could have let them rest -she  _ should have _ let them rest. She should have sat quietly in a corner until they began to stir, but she must have been spending way too much time with Robin, because as she considered the possibility of letting things run their course, all she could hear was his voice saying:  _ "And where would be the fun in that?" _

Much’s pans were very at hand –if he had put them away the night before, then maybe she wouldn’t have yielded to her most childish ways. As it was, she simply couldn’t resist. 

She grabbed the small cauldron Much used for cooking and a silver tray that had been left nearby for some reason and then, standing close to Allan’s hammock –she had always enjoyed teasing with Allan; he had reminded her a little of her brother, who she still missed terribly–, she banged them together. 

Hell broke loose quite suddenly. Startled by the noise, Allan shot up in his hammock, but the move was so unexpected that he lost his balance and fell to the ground with a loud  _ thud. _ Much and John didn't do much better -they both sat up on their beds and began searching wildly for their weapons, but it was clear that neither of them was really awake yet, and thus couldn't really see what was happening around them. 

Marian and the two new guys did a little better, but not by much. They managed to get out of bed with a certain amount of grace and they made it to their weapons relatively soon -not soon enough to prevent an attack on a real ambush, but certainly sooner than the other three. Honestly, Djaq ought to say something to them, but at for the moment she was laughing so hard that she was having trouble catching her breath. 

It was Marian who recognised her, obviously. She was the only one out the four who  _ could  _ have recognised her that still had enough wits about herself to notice that this was not one of their enemies, but a really close friend –the last friend they would have expected to find here, but a friend nonetheless. 

"Djaq?" She breathed incredulously, lowering her bow slightly so she could take a closer look at their visitor. 

The woman could only nod as she struggled to catch her breath, which was a much bigger task than she anticipated. 

"Djaq is here?" Much muttered, looking around himself, sleep still clouding his mind.

"What are you doing here?" John asked, trying to get to his feet. 

"I bring news," she stated, bending to help Allan untangle himself from the mess that had become his blankets. 

"News from the Holy Land?"

"News from England," she amended, looking at Marian, who had been the one to ask the question. 

"I’m not being funny, but how can you possibly know anything about England that we don’t already know? You only just got here!" Allan complained from the floor. 

Djaq smiled fondly at him. 

"Maybe I have better sources than you do." And then, looking up at the rest of them, she added. "Your King has returned."

"What?!" Much shrieked, pausing in the process of putting his jumper on. This particular bit of intelligence was unexpected. So unexpected, in fact, that lead him to ask a very stupid question. "What King?"

"Well, Richard, of course!"

"Are you sure?" Marian pressed.

"I should certainly hope so. I’ve been travelling with him for the last couple of months. I would be extremely put out if it turned out he’s just an impostor."

"Hold on," Allan interjected, holding his palms out for her to slow down. His head was spinning with everything she had just told them and he needed a moment to sort his thoughts out. "You’re saying that the war is over."

"Yes."

"And that the King is back in England?"

"Yes. In Nottingham!"

"The King is in Nottingham," Allan repeated, willing his brain to grasp at the words. "He’s come to deal with the Sheriff, then?"

"That’s the plan."

"Well, that’s good news!" Much exclaimed suddenly, after a moment of silence. " _ Great _ news!" He stumbled over his own feet on his way off the bed. The new boy had to grab him by his shirt to prevent him from falling to the ground. 

They had been back on English soil for a few months now, and while outwardly they had kept an appearance of utmost confidence, deep down their faith in their cause had began to fade a little bit. The King had been gone for so long and they had tried so hard to bring him back, all to no avail... No-one had said it out loud, obviously, but the idea that they would have to settle for keeping Vaisey at bay indefinitely had certainly started to float around the Outlaws’ Camp. 

(Robin had always gone out of his way to keep the morale up; with him gone, that role had remained vacant and that absence had taken its toll on the outlaws).

But now the King was back.  _ Finally _ . 

"A little context, please?" Luke asked to no one and everyone. 

"Context, right. Luke, Kate, meet Djaq. She’s part of the gang," Much said solemnly. He was more excited than he had been in months, the news of King Richard’s return having brought back some of the life Robin with his passing had taken from him. 

"Djaq?  _ Will’s _ Djaq?"

The Saracen took a closer look at the man in front of her and noticed the slight similarities to the man she loved. 

"Ah, you must be little Lukey then! Will will be delighted to see you."

"Will is here?" Allan asked, craning his neck as he expected to find the man standing among them. 

"He’s back at the King’s camp. He sends his love, though."

"Then we need to get going!" Much announced. John nodded his head in agreement and Allan quickly jumped to his feet. 

It was at times like these that one could clearly see Robin’s influence. Of course they would want to go and make themselves useful. Waiting in the shadows would be torture, even if they  _ did _ take part on the final showdown. They wanted to start doing things now –like their leader would. But Robin had learned to wait, and so would they. They had to be careful or they would end up losing more than their lives.

"No, you can’t!"

"Why shouldn’t we? You’re not suggesting we missed the party, are you?"

Djaq hastily explained the plan to them, making sure they understood how important it was that Vaisey didn’t suspect a thing. 

"It’s just two more days," she pleaded. "By diner on Sunday, everything will be over. Vaisey will be done for; you will all be pardoned... You just have to be a little more patient."

"She’s right," Marian agreed from the place where she had silently been listening to everything that was being said. "We’ve waited so long for this moment; we can wait a little more."

She had the most reason to want to go, but at the same time she recognised the dangers of moving in on the Sheriff without a clear plan. Once upon a time, she had used to chastise Robin about acting impulsively. Now things had changed, she knew, and she was wont to act a little bit too close to the reckless side from time to time, but deep down she was still the girl who had created a whole new persona to taunt Vaisey and his men without falling out of his grace. Much as she wanted to march into Nottingham right now and finally put an end to a war that had started years ago, she wasn’t going to do it. She owed her younger self better than that.

She had a point, much to everyone's dismay.  They were really eager to get a move on things, but they reluctantly decided to wait until Sunday, just like Djaq had said. After all, the last thing they wanted was the whole plan to crumble because of a silly mistake that could have easily been prevented. 

Once the initial shock of seeing their friend again started to wear off, preparations for the day began to be made. Blessedly they didn’t have anything big planned for Nottingham in the course of the next few days, nor did they expect the Sheriff to have anything in store for them either. It seemed as if good fortune was finally smiling upon them. They did have a few drop offs scheduled, though, and Djaq took advantage of this to ask those who were to go to the villages to spread the word about something big happening in Nottingham on Sunday. She would give Robin the audience he wanted. 

After lunch they separated. Kate and Allan went to Locksley while Luke and John took to Clun. Much and Marian were to have the day off. 

It was explained to Djaq that they had taken up this system so they could be sure at least two of them would always be free and rested in case of an emergency. What they didn’t tell her was that they had come up with such a system to keep a constant eye on Marian, who since the return of Vaisey and Gisborne had been growing more and more reckless. The fact that this way they could be sure that at least two of them would always be reachable was an added bonus.

It didn’t take Much long to leave in search of something special for dinner. Soon the women were alone.  

Djaq watched the other girl for a while. She sat on Robin’s bunk, gazing out of the camp as she toyed absentmindedly with the thread around her neck. The Saracen had a pretty good idea of what item hanged at the end of that thread. She had noticed early on that Robin no longer wore his trademark tag; guessing where the tag had gone (or rather, to whom it had been given) wasn’t exactly hard. 

"So, the Nightwatchman..." she said suddenly, pulling Marian from her thoughts. 

She smiled –not a happy smile, but probably as close to that as she could give her. 

"You’re not precisely in a place to chastise me,  _ Djaq, _ ” she reminded her, stressing the last word. After all, she wasn’t the only one who had taken on a different identity to fight her enemies. The Saracen didn’t reply, but she did smile a little bit. Marian  _ did  _ have a point: Djaq was probably one of the few people who had even a small inkling to what life was like for a woman whose aspirations went beyond finding a suitable husband and birthing a healthy heir. “Besides, if you’re going to say that it’s dangerous, you might as well save your breath. It has already been made quite clear that I’m being intentionally reckless."

"Are you?"

"If I were being reckless, would Gisborne still be alive?" she countered. 

"Probably not," her friend agreed. 

"Look, I’m doing my best," she said after a while. "It’s not exactly easy, but I’m managing." She was alive. She hadn’t killed Gisborne or Vaisey and her secret identity had remained a secret. That was more than she had expected a few months ago.

Marian had done a decent job of fooling her friends, but she couldn’t fool Djaq.

She had seen it before, not just here in Sherwood, but in the war as well. Every soldier went through it at some point or another: a certain moment when everything becomes too much and things simply stop making sense. All that remains at those times is sheer hatred and thirst for revenge. Djaq had had one of those, back in Acre, when her brother was killed. She had ended up captured thanks to that. Her companions hadn’t been immune to such a trend either: Robin, John, Will and even Allan to an extent had all gone through that one moment when their own safety had ceased to matter and all they had cared about was retribution in the name of those they had lost.

Now, it would seem, it was Marian’s turn to feel like that. Only that she was smarter than they were and she had decided to play the long game, rather than let her emotions take a hold of her. She may have told her friends that she wasn’t about to go after Gisborne again –and she meant it; she really wouldn’t go  _ looking _ for him- but she certainly wouldn’t pass on the opportunity either. When the time came to go to Nottingham, she would be ready –and Gisborne would finally have to face what he had done.

The rest couldn’t see this, all of them battling their own anger and pain. But Djaq could.

Just when she was finally done babysitting Robin, it would seem as if she would have to start babysitting Marian. How wonderful. 

"I know you are and I’m proud of you. Few women in your place would have done what you’re doing. But, I do feel compelled to point out that getting yourself killed in the process is not going to help anyone. That  _ is _ your endgame, is it not? To go down taking as much as the Sheriff’s men as you can?" she pointed out calmly, in an attempt to make her friend think things through. It was useless, she knew, but she had to try. She had to try  _ everything _ . 

Marian was only slightly surprised that the Saracen woman had seen through her so quickly. Robin had warned her once, long ago, that the outlaw had that power and she had seen it herself during her brief stay at the camp. 

She didn’t reply, but she didn’t really need to. 

"Marian!" Djaq said angrily. She had hoped to be wrong about this one. "You cannot be thinking about..."

But she could be. She  _ had  _ been. 

“He killed  _ Robin _ ,” Marian hissed, as if that were enough of a justification. 

“And he’s going to kill you if you’re not careful!”

Marian winced, ever so slightly, and it was then that realisation dawned upon Djaq. It wasn’t revenge she was after –or rather, not  _ just _ revenge. 

“You  _ want _ him to kill you, don’t you?”

“Robin and I, both killed by the same sword... it’s kind of poetic, don’t you think?”

It hadn’t taken her long to come up with this plan. Pretty much since the moment she had heard about what Guy had done she had decided to make him pay, not by killing him, but by hurting him –just as he had hurt her. 

She had gotten lucky pretty early on. Returning to Nottingham and finding her gone had been a huge blow to Gisborne’s confidence and she had enjoyed every minute of watching him trying to find her. Taunting him with as a Nightwatchman and shooting Robin’s arrows at him –she had saved them for really special occasions, like when she was facing Gisborne or Vaisey; everyone else got regular arrows from her– as a reminder that Robin Hood was not dead had been good too. But the time for games was over now. 

She was ready to take things to the next level: she was going to have Gisborne kill her. 

He would never come back from that, she was sure.

"Robin wouldn’t want you to get yourself killed," Dajq reminded her. She knew what she was talking about: if Robin was to be in the Courtyard and he was to see Marian and Gisborne fighting and something were to happen to her... She didn’t even want to think of what would happen then.

No, Robin would want her to live. Marian knew that. Then again, she had wanted him to live and he hadn’t cared, so he really got no saying in her life anymore.

"Then Robin should be here to stop me, don’t you think?" The former lady of Knighton said fiercely. 

It took all of Djaq not to laugh out loud.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://writerladymarianne.blogspot.com/


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know, I should be posting this either on Sunday or Monday, but I think we can all agree that I've held back for long enough, right? Besides, things in the World Cup are *not* going as I would have liked, so I need to post this before I decide to change the whole thing and kill Robin as a way to vent my frustrations. 
> 
> This chapter is not terribly interesting, but it's the set up for chapter 7, which is the chapter we all want to read, I think.
> 
> Thank you all for the continuous love and support. It really means the world to me and I hope you all know that.

**CHAPTER VI.**

It was still dark when he awoke -or, rather, when he gave up on trying to fall asleep. 

He hadn’t really slept the night before, not that he hadn’t  _ tried _ . Every good soldier knows how important a good night's rest is before a big fight, and Robin of Locksley was nothing if not a good soldier. He had retired to bed soon after supper and tried to will himself into falling asleep. 

It hadn’t worked out. 

His mind had been plagued from the second that his head had hit his pillow by images of those he cared the most about. He saw them behind his closed eyelids, their expressions shifting from cautious-hopefulness to confused-panic. 

Mostly, though, they looked furious.

He had let Djaq think that his greatest fear was finding out that the outlaws were gone, but that was far from the truth. At least not all of it, anyway. He did feel some discomfort at the prospect of not finding them in Sherwood, but he was far more worried about what they would say if they did, in fact, remain. 

He was coming back from the dead, for Pete’s sake! Much had held his hand as he drew his supposedly last breath! Robin had charmed his way out of trouble on more than one occasion, but there were limits to his power and coming back from the dead was different than anything he had ever done before. It would take more than a cheeky smile and a clever comeback to start making amends –a lot more. (Not to mention the fact that his powers were better suited to be used on girls, rather than a bunch of big, smelly males). So yes, his friends had every right to be mad at him and there wasn’t anything he could say that would make things right. It was no wonder he felt nervous.

By dawn he realised that sleep would be unobtainable, so he got to his feet and exited the cave as quietly as he could. 

He walked along his imaginary line for a while, thinking he could hear the outlaws as they went about their morning routine. They were probably chatting and laughing as they got everything ready for the day. Whether they would still be happy when they returned that night was anyone’s guess. He also took advantage of the peace and quiet of the morning to make himself presentable. He went to a nearby brook and took a quick wash. He changed into a fresh set of clothes -not his trusty hoodie, unfortunately- and shaved just enough so that he was sporting his trademark stubble. He wanted to look his best when he made his grand entrance. 

It was early morning when he finally returned to the camp, but everyone was already up and getting ready. 

"Excited?" Will asked him while he rummaged around the pile of weapons until he found a sword of his liking. (They had been travelling disguised as a group of traders, so most of their weapons had been carried separately as not to draw too much attention to themselves).

"Understatement," Robin replied with a smile as he looked longingly at the different bows that laid for them. 

"You know what she said, no archery until you’re completely healed," his friend reminded him when he followed his gaze. 

"I know," he answered with a sigh. "I just miss my things."

"You’ll have them back soon enough. Much probably hid them somewhere near Locksley."

Will was right. It had been Robin’s idea that his former manservant took his weapons back to England. Ideally, he would have liked to be buried in his own country, in his own lands, with his own family, but since that would have been impossible, he had instructed his friends to take his weapons instead and bury them in his place. Had he known that he would survive, he never would have made such a request, for he felt naked and vulnerable without his own bow to protect him. But he hadn’t known – _ couldn’t _ have known– that Gisborne would fail to kill him yet again, so his weapons had gone back to England, and Robin had had to settle with someone else’s sword. Needless to say, he wasn’t happy.

“Remind me to ask him where they are, exactly. Preferably before he chews my head off for faking my death, will you?”

Will chuckled as he adjusted his belt around his waist. 

“I think it’s safe to say that you’ll have no trouble gaining Much’s forgiveness,” he replied confidently.

“And everyone else’s?” his friend pressed, to what the younger man simply shrugged. 

“Give them a few days.”

The conversation was effectively ended by the appearance of the King. He was dressed in full Templar attire, the only one of the group dressed like that -an imposing sight if there ever was one.  

Everybody was clear on what they had to do, but he repeated his instructions one last time just to be sure that everything was clear. Their party would be broken into three distinct groups. Will and the King’s page were to leave first and head directly into Nottingham to make sure that everything was in place for their arrival. The young boy was then supposed to proceed further up north and meet with the troops from York, while Will stayed in Nottingham to serve as middle-man between them and the outlaws -a role he would be sharing with Djaq, as not to draw too much attention to either of them. 

Sir Frederick of Kent, one of the King’s oldest friends and right-hand-man, was to disguise himself as a trader and ride a cart they had acquired for the occasion into town. The four remaining knights were to hide inside that cart and wait for the right moment to make their appearance known. 

Robin and Richard would be the last to leave. The King had allowed his young commander to plan their grand entrance and -Robin being Robin- he had ran with it. He would put on a show, alright, something neither Gisborne nor Vaisey would ever forget, assuming they made it through the day. 

He had decided, then, that the two of them would ride into Nottingham when everyone else was in position. They would make their way into the castle -a simple enough task for Robin Hood- and they would wait until the outlaws and the knights had created enough of a distraction for Richard to emerge. That  _ should _ be enough to prevent Vaisey from launching any sort of attack, but Robin would remain on the sidelines, just in case he tried anything funny. 

If finding the rightful King of England in his courtyard didn’t do the trick, finding a back-from-the-dead Robin Hood certainly ought to do. 

“See you in Nottingham!,” Will called out happily as he and the young servant got on their way.

Robin was too choked up to reply.

Sir Frederick and his men set out shortly thereafter, but Robin and Richard had to wait for a while -a price to pay for the drama they were trying to create. The sovereign managed his excitement well enough, but the young lord couldn't be still. He examined every inch of their camp to make sure that every small trace of their presence was erased, he checked that both of them were sufficiently armed and he went over the plan out loud -again- to make sure that he wasn't missing anything. Tempted as he was to simply order him to sit still for a while, his liege allowed him to do as he pleased. He knew that his friend had a lot on his mind and on his heart so that the best he could do for him was to stay out of his way.

When the time finally came for them to leave Richard got to his feet and fixed his cloak around him so that his clothes were perfectly hidden.

“Lead the way, then,” he told his friend and for the first time in a very long while, the young man allowed himself to smile in anticipation.

Robin had set out three clear paths, one for each of the groups. The one he had assigned to the two of them was the one that ran deepest through the forest, consequently closest to the outlaws’ camp. This shouldn’t have been a problem, for the outlaws were supposed to be already in Nottingham, but as he rode along the familiar roads, he half expected to fall victim to one of their ambushes. He couldn’t help but laugh out loud, weariness slowly but surely being replaced by excitement, as he imagined what would happen if they were delayed by falling victim to one of the outlaws’ traps.

The King noticed this but made no comment. 

Robin deserved to be excited, and honestly, he hadn’t seen his young friend this happy in a very long time. Come to think about it, he wasn’t sure he had ever seen him like this –not in the Holy Land, at least.

They arrived in Nottingham without complications. They left their horses tied in front of the Inn, lest someone grow suspicious of two unattended animals wandering about the town and proceeded by foot towards the castle. Robin's favourite way in and out was usually by climbing the outer wall. Not only were the battlements the least guarded part of the building, they also afforded a great view of the courtyard below. It would be the perfect spot from which they could emerge.

But Djaq had predicted he would say something like that, so she had made him promise that he would find another way and, quite frankly she was right to suggest so. Robin was an expert at putting on a good front, but the truth was that it was unlikely he would be able to climb even if he wanted to. He was still weak, barely able to stand for too long. Exerting himself before the big reveal would be an unnecessary risk and he was glad that Djaq had given him a way out.  

So he had chosen the kitchens instead, where security wasn't particularly tight either, but the physical effort would be significantly less demanding. It should be simple enough for them to get to the main door from there.

He had gone through the scene time and time again in his mind, both on the ship that was bringing him back and the weeks before that, bedridden as he was and with only his thoughts for company. He had seen himself walking down the familiar streets, had imagined how he would feel like being back here again. He had made plans and backup plans, trying to be ready for any and all eventualities. He was certain that he had succeeded; he was certain that he knew how it would feel like to walk the familiar paths of his city. 

He had been wrong.

This wasn’t the first time he had to return to Nottingham after a long absence –this wasn’t even the first time he came back from the dead (he was sure that not many people had held many hopes of his survival after he was gone for five years the first time around), and yet it was different now than it was then. Everything was different. 

_ He  _ was different.

Death has a way of putting things into perspective. He had learnt that the hard way. 

Before, he had come as someone disenchanted with the war, looking for comfort in the familiar setting of his own country. He had also been young enough, and arrogant enough to believe himself worthy of at least some admiration. Glory had long since stopped being his main goal, but a part of him had been glad to be appreciated. But now he knew better –he knew that England was not what he remembered from his childhood and that comfort was the last thing he should expect. Worse still was the knowledge that things had probably gotten worse in his absence, and there wasn’t one soul that would rejoice at his presence. Not completely, at least. His little stunt –as unintentional as it had been– had hurt many people in ways he couldn’t even begin to imagine. 

So instead of feeling warm and safe as he  _ wanted _ to feel –as he had felt when he rode with Much by his side–, he felt anxious and vulnerable. He also felt as if all eyes were on him,  _ not _ a good feeling to have as one was trying to make his way unnoticed. 

They were almost by the gate when Robin heard the all-too-familiar whistle that had become the outlaws’ trademark. 

Signalling the King to stay put, he moved swiftly towards the source of the noise, half expecting to find Allan or John when he turned the corner. It wasn’t either of them.

"You look like hell," Djaq informed him when he was close enough. 

"And yet, I probably still look better than I did the last time I saw the lads," he countered with a grin. It was true. The dark circles he was probably sporting under his eyes and his pale skin were nothing compared to how he had looked a few months ago. At least he was alive and standing. And the ground beneath him wasn’t tainted by his blood. 

Djaq was not amused. Even though a part of her had been expecting something like this from Robin, she had really hoped he would be a bit more mindful of his current state and take better care of himself. Especially after what she had learned back at the camp: she would have her hands full looking after Marian to make sure that she didn’t do something stupid, she could have really done without Robin exhausting himself to death too. 

"You should have rested. You are still weak," she told him angrily.

He waved her off, just as she knew he would. Despite his obvious tiredness, he looked excited underneath. His eyes were shining with the familiar mischief that had been absent for so long and his grin was face-splitting. 

"Enough about me," he said with finality. He was tired of being treated like a baby; he was eager to go back to being his old self. "What about you? What news do you bring?"

"You will be pleased to know that everyone is still here who was supposed to be here. Plus a few more."

Robin sighed in relief. At least that was one less problem to worry about. His gang was here; they were safe and hadn’t gotten themselves killed. Good. 

"So they are fine? John, Allan...  _ Much _ ?" he pressed, just to be sure. 

"All of them, they are perfectly fine. They’ve even recruited a few more in your name."

"A few more?" He asked curiously. "Who?"

"Well, Luke Scarlett, for one. And another girl from Locksley, Kate. I think her mother is the potter." Robin nodded; he knew the girl. "Also..."

"What?" Robin pressed, noticing her reluctance. 

Djaq had briefly toyed with the idea of not telling Robin about what she had found at the outlaws’ camp but finally decided against it. Robin would find out eventually, and if he stepped into the courtyard unprepared he could possibly put all of them in danger. Even though he had matured some in the past few months, she doubted he possessed the self-control required  _ not  _ to react when he found out that the woman he loved was once again in harm’s way. "I’m only telling you this because you’re going to find out sooner rather than later and it’s best if you have some sort of warning." She paused for a moment. "Marian is here."

Her words felt like a slap in the face.

"What?" He shrieked loudly, making a group of women that were passing by to turn in their direction and look curiously at the pair. Fortunately, they had their hoods up, which rendered them no different than any other outlaw that was usually seen around town. Still, Djaq squeezed his shoulder tightly to remind him to be quiet and dragged him deeper into the alley, away from prying eyes. "What do you mean that Marian is here?" He added in a low whisper. 

"I mean that she is  _ here _ . Really, I can’t be any more clear than that, Robin."

"What is she  _ doing _ here?"

"She’s sort of part of the gang. Or rather, the Nightwatchman is."

Robin felt like punching something. 

It wasn’t that he hadn’t thought of the possibility. He had always known, from the moment he got into the ship that was to take him to the Holy Land, that there was a very strong chance he would return to find Marian still in the castle, still playing her role as a double agent. Still in grave danger. He had put a great deal of effort to keep her safe, even from the distance, so instead of wasting what he thought were his final breaths informing Gisborne that the woman he intended to marry had spent the last couple of years dressing up as the Nightwatchman and stealing from right under his nose (like he was very tempted to do), he had taken her secret to the grave. 

Finding her here really shouldn’t come as that big of a surprise. And yet it did. 

Because he didn’t  _ want _ her to be here. He had prayed and pleaded that she wasn’t here. 

Announcing his survival before the better part of Nottinghamshire was hard enough. Doing so in front of the very people who had watched him die was worse. He had drawn some comfort from the fact that Marian, at least, wouldn’t be there –that he would have a few more days to find the right way to tell her. It wasn’t much, but it was  _ something _ . He would have enough dealing with Much’s pain and disappointment, he had been really happy he wouldn’t have to deal with hers too. Not yet. Not here. 

But since when did Marian make things any easier on him? Of course she had stayed, and of course, she was here right now. And of course, she would be shocked and angry to see him again, which would certainly make her a liability. 

So Marian was in danger –again. And he was in no small part responsible for that. 

Great.

"This wasn’t part of the plan," he said dangerously. "This changes everything."

"No, it doesn’t. Think of her as you would of Much or John."

"She’s neither one nor the other!" Much, and especially John, had some sort of self-control. Angry at him as they would certainly be, they would know better than to attack him in the middle of the courtyard. They would deal with Vaisey and  _ then _ with him. Marian was much more impulsive, a trait –he had to admit– she had always shared with him. Additionally, there was also Gisborne to take into account.

Djaq had mentioned that Marian was living under the Nightwatchman’s identity, so chances were that Gisborne didn’t know who she really was. But that was about to change, obviously. No way would Marian stand quietly on the sides when it became known that he was alive and no way would Gisborne not have something to say about it. She would be in danger -more than she already was.

_ Perfect _ , Robin thought, biting his lip to keep from screaming.  _ Just great _ . As if he wasn’t feeling guilty already...

"Maybe, but she is as much part of the gang as ever they were. She can hold her own."

He paused for a moment. 

Djaq was absolutely correct, of course. She wasn’t some damsel in distress he would have to swoop in to save. She was strong and brave and possibly more skilled a fighter than some of Vaisey’s soldiers. And yet...

"Keep an eye on her, alright? Keep her out of the way."

"I’ll try my best, but have you met Marian? It’s probably not going to be that simple."

Robin winced. That was exactly what he was afraid of.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://writerladymarianne.blogspot.com/


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, here it is, the chapter we have all been waiting for. 
> 
> This is the chapter that gave birth to the whole story: I had this scene in my mind and I wrote everything else around it. I am beyond proud of it, so I hope you will enjoy it too. I look forward to hearing what you think.

**CHAPTER VII.**

"I have a bad feeling," Much said, fidgeting with the hem of his hood.

"Yeah, I know, you’ve said that already. Relax, everything is going to be just fine," Allan replied tiredly, but casting a nervous glance around himself just to be safe.

They were both standing among the slowly-growing crowd in the courtyard. Alone. The six outlaws plus Djaq had arrived an hour or so ago and had spent most of that time going around town making sure Richard didn’t run into any unforeseen complications on his way in. They had agreed to reconvene back at the courtyard, but at the moment only the two of them had made it back, which to Allan was perfectly normal, but to Much it meant some terrible omen.

"What if he got lost? What if he was captured? What if it’s all a ploy and Djaq was in on it?" the former servant pointed out, his words coming out quickly.

The ridiculousness of Much’s worries made Allan finally tear his attention from the crowd around them and fix his friend with a bemused look.

"Are you even listening to what  you're saying? This’ _Djaq_ we’re talking about! Course she’s not in on any ploy! Quit worrying, will you? Tonight we’ll dine at the castle!"

"I’ll believe it when I see it..." the other man muttered, reluctant to allow himself to feel hope just yet. He had made that mistake before. He had allowed himself to believe that things would be alright, that he would live out his days in Bonchurch, just like Robin had promised him. When that didn’t work out, he had at least imagined that the King would return much sooner than he actually did -that Robin would be here to see it through, if nothing else. Robin had thought so too, and he had died. Much wasn’t about to make the same mistake. He would not feel hopeful -not until he had solid proof that it was really over. His heart couldn’t take any more false hope.

Robin would be proud of him, he decided.

"I can’t believe the mention of food doesn’t have you breaking into a song," a voice commented from behind them. "You’ve changed, Much."

Both men turned to find Will Scarlett smiling at them from under his hood.

However prepared they both were by Djaq’s warnings, seeing their young friend was still shocking. The last time either of them had laid eyes on him, he had been dressed in the traditional Arab attire, his skin had been tanned from the long hours spent under the cruel sun of the desert and his eyes had looked tired and solemn. But now here he was. English as ever, eyes sparkling with amusement and lips curling ever-so-slightly upwards. The same Will Scarlett who had been defying Sheriff Vaisey and Guy of Gisborne before any of the rest of them thought of it; the same Will Scarlett who had given his all for the people in Nottingham.

His presence caused different reactions on his friends. To Much, he was the solid proof he so desperately needed. If Djaq had told the truth about Will, then surely, she must have told the truth about everything else. King Richard must be really back, then. And safe, because Will was smart enough not to abandon him if he suspected any kind of trouble in the horizon.

"You really are here. I cannot believe you are really here!" Much muttered in awe, his eyes full of hope and wonder too strong to be contained anymore.

"Of course, Much. There isn’t anywhere else I rather be right now.”

Allan’s reaction was also exultant, but guided by more selfish thoughts. He had missed Robin and he had missed Djaq, and he was obviously glad that the King was finally back and they would be able to defeat Vaisey, but in reality it was Will’s return that he was most excited about. He had understood his reasons for staying behind, but he had also secretly hoped he would change his mind soon. Allan loved all the lads, but there was something he shared with Will that no one else understood. There’s something about facing impending death together, he thought -it brings people together.

“It’s good to see you again. I’m glad the missus allowed you to come back,” he joked good-naturally.

“And I’m glad to find you here. I wasn’t sure whose side you would be on this week,” Will depaned, and if Allan didn’t know him so well, he might have believed that there was actual anger behind his words. But there wasn’t. Will was just being Will.

“Missed you, kid,” he said, wrapping his arms around the other man’s shoulders. “It’s not the same here without you.”

“I know. I’ve missed you too.”

"I just wish Robin was here to see it. He would be so happy that the King was back..." Much continued idly, oblivious to their exchange. He also didn’t seem to remember they were in the middle of Nottingham, surrounded by preying ears. Mentioning Richard’s impending return was not the smarter thing to do and Much should know better by now.

"Shut up, Much."

"Right. You are right. We can’t risk anyone hearing us. Sorry. I’m just _so_ excited!"

They were soon joined by the rest of the outlaws who were really thrilled to see their friend again -Luke more than anyone. Will, who had had no idea of his brother’s whereabouts was slightly surprised, but he couldn’t help but feeling a certain amount of pride. He was glad he had taken over the place he had left vacant.

Djaq also joined them some time later and filled them in on the latest developments she had discussed with “someone close to the King”.

"Everyone is in position, so it will be our job to create an opening," she informed them in hush whispers. "We’ll have to get the Sheriff away from the castle, so the King can make his entrance."

They decided to keep it simple. There was no need for them to go out of their way to create a big fuss when their mere presence would be enough to get Vaisey's attention.

“We have to get Vaisey and Gisborne away from the door, so after I've got their attention one of us should go after the Sheriff,” Marian reasoned.

“I'll do it,” Much announced. His face was a mask of steel and he looked more determined than ever. He would deal with Vaisey -for Robin.

Their eyes met and there was no need for words. They had known each other as kids -they had both loved Robin in different but equally strong ways. They knew perfectly well what the other was feeling and thinking.

Marian gave a little nod in his direction and then continued to the rest of the groups.

“Good. Djaq, you should stay free so that you can be certain that you won't miss the king's signal. And John, you should stay by the gate, in case someone tries to make a run for it.”

“Will should stay close to the wagon,” Djaq pointed out.

“I’ll go with,” Allan declared.

“Good then. Luke, Kate, the three of us will mingle with the crowd. Say the word, Djaq, and we’ll get the show started.”

“Be careful, Marian,” Much begged.

“I will,” she promised, though something in her eyes didn’t fill Much with confidence. “You too, Much.”

“What do you say, big guy? Good day?”

John smiled. The question, addressed by Will to him, was really intended to the group in general, and it was to them that he directed their answer.

“No,” he declared. “Today _is not_ a good day to die.”

“Here, here,” agreed Allan.

“See you when this is over,” Marian said. Only Djaq could see that she was hiding her true intentions, but she couldn’t bring that up now. All she could do was hope for the best -that, or tell Marian that her former betrothed would be watching over her -actually, _physically_ watching over her, not in the metaphorical kind of way-, so she better not try anything stupid. The Saracen didn’t think that such a revelation would be any helpful at a time like this, so she decided to bite her tongue as she watched her disappearing among the gathered peasants.

While the outlaws were dealing with things outside Nottingham Castle, Robin and Richard were by now already inside, the young man leading the way along the long corridors. They didn’t find many guards in their path, and the ones they did were quickly incapacitated before they could raise the alarm. They arrived at the stone steps with time to spare.

Hiding behind a door, Robin cast a quick glance around the courtyard, making sure everything and everyone was where they were supposed to be.

He found her right away, drawn to her as he had always been. Her hood was up, her face was covered and she was partially hidden behind a large man, but Robin had no trouble recognizing her at once.

Time and distance had done little to diminish the hold she had of his heart. If anything, it was stronger now than it had ever been. Her body called out to his and he had to make a conscious effort not to follow his instincts and run to her.

 _Not yet,_ he told himself. Not while Vaisey was still a free man. Not with Gisborne so close to her.

Both men were already there, their backs to the castle as the Sheriff addressed the crowd in one of his usual _“Weekly briefings”_ -it was a thing he did on Sundays after mass: he would stand just outside the castle and basically lie through his teeth, telling everyone how great things were going in all of England thanks for their sacrifices. Robin hated this habit, but this time he was actually glad for it. He loved the idea of using Vaisey's own scheme as his undoing.

Guy stood next to his master, eyes scanning the crowd probably in search of any troublemakers. It was ironic that the greatest trouble maker of all was standing just behind him and his men -and the woman he claimed to be madly in love with- were right under his nose and Gisborne was perfectly oblivious to them all.

Robin made a mental note to point out, if he got the chance, that it had taken him approximately thirty seconds to find Marian's face in the crowd while Guy had probably been staring right at her face for quite some time and he had yet to see her. Some suitor he was…

He tore his eyes away from Marian  with great effort and focused his attention on the topic at hand.

He could make his move now, he thought. Both men were distracted enough that King Richard could easily sneak up on them completely unnoticed,  but the guards would probably be upon them before half of the people at the courtyard knew what was going on. No, they needed time to build up to the big scene.

He took another look at the landscape before him, his keen mind coming up with and discarting plans in quick succession. His eyes finally found the lone guard on the battlement and he suddenly knew what to do.

He explained his plan to Richard in a low whisper and at his nod of approval he left to his new post.

He made his way across the castle with ease, as most guards were either out in the courtyard or spread across the gallery around it. The entrance to the tower was unguarded too, as were the stairs. They young custodian that was supposed to patrol the wall was easily knocked out of the way and the bow he had been carrying appropriated. He had promised Djaq that he wouldn’t use one and he planned to keep his word if at all possible. But it was a comfort to have it at his side just in case.

Robin chose a spot directly across the front door from where he could monitor the whole scene. He made sure that his men and the king’s were in position and that they hadn’t been found out. Then he took a deep breath, produced a small reflecting glass from his pocket and pointed the small beam of light it reflected towards Djaq.

“It’s showtime,” he whispered to himself, putting away the device before it caught anyone else’s attention.

The Saracen followed the light to his position, shot him a glare that was full of both excitement and exasperation and made a signal of her own to Marian.

The young noblewoman had her bow ready, with one of Robin’s arrows poised in place, but she still took a few seconds before she acted. She aimed her weapon to a spot a few inches above Vaisey’s head -high enough that it would graze his skin without hurting him. It was a difficult shot -a shot Robin would be proud of.

It was of him that she thought of as she released her arrow. She thought of his hands on hers as he taught her how to stand, of his firm chest against the back of her head as he held her close. She thought of his sweet breath in her ear and the sound of his laugh when she made her first shot and completely missed her target.

She wouldn’t miss _now_ ; she would make him proud.

Her arrow flew true and certain and embedded itself on the door just behind Vaisey, just as she had planned.

 _Proud indeed_ , she told herself.

Vaisey raised his hands and touched his head to make sure that he wasn’t hurt, which was a rather comical sight to anyone who wasn’t under his thumb. Once he was sure that he had sustained no injury, he focused his attention on the crowd before him to find the source of the attack.

He had realized several months ago that while Hood had stayed behind in the Holy Land to become food for worms, his _weapons_ had somehow made it back to England and -more importantly- right into the Nightwatchman’s hands. How or why it was that said man had come to take Hood’s place, Vaisey didn’t know, but he was intent to find out. The outlaws he didn’t much care about anymore -they were but a group of renegade peasants he could deal with easily enough, but their new leader was another story. It was clear from their several encounters in the past couple of months that this was no ordinary outlaw: he was fairly skilled with the bow -more than any other of Hood’s men. He appeared educated too, going by the way he moved and held himself -more reminiscent of a noble rather than of a peasant. More importantly, he had yet to say a word in front of _anyone_ and that was as rare as it was confusing.

All in all, Vaisey was really curious to know the Nightwatchman’s true identity, so when his eyes found him standing among the crowd -because Marian had at this point ceased her attempts to blend in and was now staring defyingly at him-, he immediately gave the order to his men to apprehend him.

The guards moved in unisom, like cogs in a well-oiled machine. But the outlaws were ready for them.

Swords were drawn and hoods were dropped. Metal met metal or sometimes skin. Peasants shrieked in terror and moved hastily out of the way. Soon, the courtyard had descended into chaos, so the king’s men took the opportunity to slip in unnoticed and join the outlaws in the fight.

Robin watched from his vantage point, heart beating frantically in his chest and eyes darting quickly from one outlaw to the another, making sure they were all doing okay. It was hard to keep track of everyone as they were moving so fast, but that didn’t stop him from trying. His whole body was urging him to jump in, to help. His hands held the borrowed bow so tightly that his knuckles turned white.

He had already known that staying out of the way would be hard, but he hadn’t anticipated just how much so. The worst moment was when he noticed Marian and Much breaking from the crowd to engage Gisborne and Vaisey in a fight. He very nearly jumped in then, caution be damned, because there was no way in hell that he would allow any kind of ill befall either of them, even if Richard’s safety laid in the balance, but he spotted a tiny gesture made by Will in his direction. Perceptive as the young man had always been, he had realized that his friend was probably having a horrible time and with that one look he was reminding him of what he had to do.

“ _They will be fine_ ,” his blue eyes screamed and Robin couldn’t help but agree with him.

Especially when he realised he was probably right. Everything appeared to be going exactly as planned.

He had always known Marian to be an exceptional fighter –he would often tease her and say it was because she had learned from the best, but the truth was that she was talented by nature and always eager to improve–, but there was something different about her today. Even with her mask on and the distance stretched across them, he could see her fierce determination shining in her icy blue eyes and the way she wielded her sword as she made her way resolutely towards Gisborne told him she wasn’t fighting to wound –she was going for the kill.

Much, too, seemed to be particularly daring today. He had never enjoyed fighting, like his former master had, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t an exceptionally accomplished warrior. After all, he had survived for five years in the desert, and although he had had a little help from Robin from time to time, such a monumental task had required a certain amount of talent as well. Today more than any other day, that talent showed and Robin felt incredible proud of his best friend. Doing what he was doing –fighting his way towards the Sheriff– couldn’t be easy, and the fact that he was giving it his all proved how much he still cared about Robin: even if his friend was dead, Much would still do what he had asked of him, he would still fight for Richard; he had done so in the Holy Land, and he would certainly do the same thing here in Nottingham. For Robin.

Far from putting his mind at ease, seeing how the two people he cared about the most in the world for managed without him somehow made things worse for the young nobleman. He could see now, loud and clear, the effects his absence had had on them: these weren’t the same people he had left behind all those months ago; they had changed –his _death_ had changed them– and it was unclear whether he would be able to change them back –or even if they would want him to try.

It couldn’t have been more than minutes before Much –and Frederick, who had joined him soon after the fight had started– managed to take Vaisey far enough from the doors, but for Robin time had never moved more slowly. Gisborne had moved too. He was now still on the stone steps of Nottingham castle, on the other side of Vaisey, his attention completely on the Nightwatchman.

It was time to act.

 _Finally_.

Taking care not to be seen, Robin peeked out of his hiding place and made his second signal.

Being every bit the man of action that Robin was –and having almost as hard a time a he was having staying out of the way–, King Richard received his sign, removed his cloak and made his entrance into the courtyard.

“Sheriff Vaisey,” he called in a deep, commanding voice that resonated all over the place. The red cross on the front of his tunic contrasted against the grey of the walls behind him, making him quite the sight. Couple that with the shock of his sudden arrival and it was no wonder that several guards stopped fighting, dropped their swords and raised their arms in surrender.

 _“Some of the guards have some sort of moral compass that will prevent them from attacking their own king,”_ Robin had predicted. He had been right - _these_ were those guards.

Busy as he was fighting two people at the same time -and trying to understand why there suddenly seemed to be so many outlaws in his town-, the Sheriff didn’t at first realise he was being called upon. He did, however, feel the slight change in the atmosphere around him and he saw Much’s pleased smile when he spotted something right behind him. Curious as he was, he stole a glance over his shoulder and very nearly tumbled over to the ground in shock. From his position, Robin even had the pleasure of watching as his enemy turned a nice shade of green, which caused the young lord to chuckle softly.

“What-” he began, unable to find the right words to phrase his thoughts.

“Surrender the town, Vaisey, and we might show mercy,” the King continued, a small smile playing at his lips at the other man’s obvious discomfort.

This second statement finally caught Gisborne’s attention and he turned his body slightly so he could have a clearer view of what was going on.

“The King!” he exclaimed in shock.

At his words, several of the guard that had remained fighting stopped abruptly and cast nervous glances around themselves. They were between the rock and a hard place: on the one hand, they answered to Vaisey and they ought to do as he ordered them, but the king was the king, and his authority overruled that of the Sheriff.

The outlaws could have taken the opportunity to make quick work of their enemies, but they were all confident that most of them were past the point of trying anything funny. Additionally, they were all too busy marvelling at the fact that King Richard was well and truly here -that it wasn’t just a rumor or an impostor. He was back.

They had won, regardless of what happened next.

Robin Hood had won.

Vaisey continued to stare at his rival for several seconds, his jaw dropping and closing with words that simply wouldn’t come. To say that he was “surprised” at this sudden turn of events would be an understatement. Never in a million years would he have expected King Richard the Lionheart to be standing in his very own courtyard. Not like this. He had been sure that they had some time –that it would still be a few months before the man returned to England, _at least_ – and he had also been certain that he had other things to handle before coming to Nottingham, a relatively small town that wasn’t even on his way to London. How he had managed to move halfway across the country without anyone knowing it was another mystery and if he hadn’t been so angry and confused –and also a bit terrified– he would have given the matter more thought. As it was, the only thing he could do was try to find a way to escape.

He was already in too deep to pledge his allegiance to Richard, but he might still find a way to defeat him.

“That’s not the King!” he said with as much firmness as he could master. It was a weak attempt, almost unworthy of a cunning mind such as his. But it was also the only card he had left to play. No-one here had ever been even remotely close to King Richard; no-one here was even sure of what he looked like. There had been an impostor once, and Vaisey had been able to sell that he had had nothing to do with that. Maybe, just maybe, he could do it again. Perhaps his guards were dim-witted enough to believe that someone had sent a performer to play the part of the King for some reason or another. “That’s an impostor! _Seize him_!”

Some guards made a half-felt attempt to charge at the man, but were quickly stopped by the crusaders. ( _Another one of Robin’s predictions that had come true_ , King Richard thought with a smile). Most of them, though, just stood in their place, too stunned and too scared to do anything. Some even tried to run away, only to be stopped by John at the gate. Vaisey himself couldn’t do much, having both Sir Frederick and Much pointing their swords at him.

Seeing that he was the only one in a position to get to the king, Gisborne decided that the Nightwatchman was not important enough to keep him from dealing with this other -much more pressing- problem, so he quickly turned on his heels and made it towards Richard, attempting to end what he himself had started years ago. Robin decided that it was high time that he made his presence known, but apparently he wasn’t the only one with the same idea.

“Forget it, Guy,” Marian said softly yet sternly. Her voice carried through the courtyard, all the way to the battlements, freezing Robin in his place. _What is she trying to do?_ , he thought desperately. Knowing Marian it would surely be something reckless that would end up complicating things for him. Why did she have to do this? Why couldn’t she simply sit this one out? “It’s over.”

But Robin wasn’t the only one petrified by the sound of her voice. Guy of Gisborne stopped as if struck by lighting and turned to the source of those words, a look of utter horror upon his face. It was a voice he had not heard in months, coming out of the mouth of his worst enemy.

“Marian?” he asked faintly.

Lady Knighton sheathed her sword and slowly removed her mask and hood, letting her long dark curls fall freely down her back.

Gisborne was surprised to see her, but so was Robin. Weeks and months had been spent dreaming of this very moment –or rather, dreaming of _her._

A lot had happened to Robin since the regicide attempt and clearly he was not the same man who had left England. One thing, however, had never changed: his love for Marian. He had tried not to let his feelings cloud his judgment and he had actually succeeded for the most part, but that was over now. At that moment, seeing her looking fiercely at his would-be killer, seeing her trying to protect the King with her own life, seeing her as part of his gang –fighting in his name, with his weapon, for his cause... Nothing mattered. Nothing but her.

For half a second he was actually relieved that she had stayed, because he didn’t think he could have lived without her for a moment longer. But then he noticed how close she was standing to Gisborne and that temporary calm went flying out the window. He would much rather live without her for a few more days if it meant she would be safe.

“What are you doing here?” Guy asked unthinkingly.

“What does it look like I’m doing?” she replied, a fierce smile across her lips. Clearly she was enjoying watching him suffer, and Robin was more worried than he was amused. Gisborne was dangerous and he wasn’t particularly comfortable with her taunting him. “I’m putting an end to yours and Vaisey’s plans. You’re done now. It’s over. We’ve won.”

“You... You are with them?” he asked in disbelief. His obvious confusion brought a tiny smile to Robin’s face, though the general weariness didn’t leave him completely.

This time there was a real happiness behind her smile.

“Of course I’m with them. I’ve _always_ been with them. All this time I’ve been fighting for England.”

Gisborne looked so out-of-sorts that it was almost pitiful to watch. Then again, he kind of deserved what he was getting. After everything he had done, not just to Marian, but basically to the whole of Nottinghamshire, it was high time he got what was coming his way.

Losing Marian –or even the _idea_ he had of her– hurt him more than pretty much anything else in the world.

“I could never be with someone like you. I could never _love_ someone like you. I would rather die than be with you, Guy of Gisborne.”

He started to shake his head before she was even done talking, like a stubborn child who refuses to see reason.

“No. You’re lying. They’ve filled your head with lies. I’m going to take care of this and then you and I are going to work things out,” he said, taking a step closer towards her.

“I loved _Robin Hood_ ,” she spat the name, knowing it would hurt him more than anything else she could have said. Her voice echoed across the the courtyard, bringing every pair of eyes towards the two of them. “I was going to _marry_ Robin Hood,” she pressed, her eyes sparking with pain and loss. “Did you know that? Did you know that I was working with him while I was in the castle? Did you know that the only thing keeping me in Nottingham was my father and that as soon as he died I went to Sherwood with him?”

It was good to have the words out in the open. Marian had been waiting for this chance for months. She wanted Guy to know –she wanted him to suffer at least a scrap of what she had suffered.

Never before had Robin had more trouble staying put than he did at that very moment. He wanted –needed– to run to Marian’s side and hold her in his arms again. The pain he heard in her voice was much, much worse than the one he had felt when he was stabbed, and the fact that it had been him who caused it certainly didn’t help putting his mind at ease. He pressed his forehead against the cold stone wall and shut his eyes tightly, praying with all his might that the situation may resolved itself quickly so he could start _trying_ to make amends.

“Robin Hood is dead,” Guy said with as much force as he could.

“No, he isn’t,” Marian replied calmly, with so much certainty that Robin had to look at her to make sure his position hadn’t been compromised. He needn’t have worried, though, for by the looks of it Marian had no idea he was nowhere near them.

“He still lives in the hearts of those who loved him,” she continued softly, sounding as she thoroughly believed the words she was saying. “He lives through his peasants and the people he helped. He lives through _this_ ,” she added, gesturing around the courtyard. Several peasants exchanged some looks before nodding their heads in approval. “Don’t you see it? Even dead he’s managed to best you: he’s brought the King home! Each and every one of us here, Guy... _We_ are Robin Hood.”

Guy shook his head again, as if by doing so he could prevent himself from listening to Marian’s words.

“No,” he said stubbornly.

She reached out inside her vest a produced a thin thread, from which two objects dangled.

Robin honestly didn’t know which item was worse to look at: his ring and his tag, two symbols of his commitment to her both as Lord of Locksley and as the champion of the poor; two sides of him, both equally devoted to her -equally in love with her. One heart in her hands.

“I will _never_ stop loving Robin Hood,” Marian hissed, her body inching forward as if challenging Gisborne to do something.

And something he did.

Hearing her profess her never-ending love for the person he hated the most was the final straw for Guy of Gisborne.

But he wasn’t the only one who decided to act.

Vaisey had been quiet as the drama between his lieutenant and his so-called love unfolded, but now he saw an opening -the only one he was going to get, for sure- and took it.

It really was fortunate that Robin was still at his core Richard’s man and had been therefore keeping an eye on the King while he followed intently what was going on with Guy and Marian. Anyone else might have missed what happened next and the history would have gone differently then.

Guy raised his sword at the same time as Vaisey’s fingers curled around the hilt of his own. The Sheriff had decided to take advantage of everyone’s distraction to take matters into his own hands and finally put an end to Richard’s life. Robin already had the arrow in place, but there was no way he could hit both men in time before either struck their blow.

Richard or Marian, who should he save?

It was in that moment that Robin’s true colours finally showed.

Once upon a time, he had been a soldier. He had gone to the Holy Land wanting to make a name for his own. He had been tired of people calling him a “kid” (he had lost his father very young and other nobles had been reluctant to see him as a worthy heir), and had decided to prove them all wrong by joining the King’s Private Guard and fighting alongside him against the infidels. He had been after glory and recognition and there was nothing he wouldn’t have given for his liege. That side of him had remained even after coming back from the war. It was that side that had pushed him to save Allan and the Scarletts as soon as he got back home, that side that had gotten him outlawed. It was because of that soldier that he had agreed to go back to the Holy Land and attempted to bring the King back, even after being accused of treason and being left in the desert to die. It was because of that boy he had once been that he had not let anyone know he had survived, even if every day that went by he felt his heart breaking a little more as he thought about what his friends must be going through.

He had done all those things because he was a soldier. He was Robin of Locksley, captain of the King’s Private Guard, and it was his duty as such to protect England and its King at all costs.

But at that very moment he was none of those things.

He was just a young man, watching as the woman he loved was about to be taken from him by his enemy.

Saying he made a decision would be incorrect because there wasn’t a decision to be made. His body moved on its own accord, more out of instinct than guided by any conscious thought, and he doubted he would have been able to change courses even if he had tried. Not that he did. His priorities were suddenly very clear.

“Much, watch out!” he called out at the same time as he turned his body slightly to the left and released the arrow. (Just because he had decided to save one didn’t mean he wouldn’t do everything in his power to save the other –in this case, charging someone he had absolute faith in with the task). The pain was instantaneous, but he paid it no mind at all. Not until he was sure he had succeeded.

Much looked around himself, bewildered at the voice he sort of thought he recognised. He didn’t have time to dwell on that, though, for his eyes quickly saw what the Sheriff was about to do. Their swords crashed in the air –just a few inches from the King’s face– at the same time as Robin’s arrow collided against Gisborne’s shoulder, causing him to drop the sword just next to Marian’s feet. The woman took a step back almost in a daze and cast a glance around herself looking for her saviour.

With Frederick’s and Will’s help, Much was soon able to incapacitate Vaisey and pin him to the ground.

“Had to try, didn’t I?” the man commented lightly.

There was utter silence after that, except for Guy’s grunts as he tried to reach for the arrow and remove it from his shoulder. Robin sat for a few moments trying to quell his racing heart and his aching side. Too close; it had been too close.

He would have to have a conversation with Marian about taunting one’s enemies –even if one was finally declaring one’s unconditional love for a certain outlaw. What was worse was that she had been carrying a sword around her waist, but she had had no intention to draw it.

_Had Marian just tried to kill herself?_

He didn’t have time to think about that. There would be plenty of time to go through the scene over and over again and determine Marian’s end game. There would be room for self-loathing too then, and possibly a big fight, because he knew that there was no way that Marian would admit to any wrongdoing. For now, though, he had bigger things to care about.

When he was finally in control of his emotions, he looked up and met the King’s eye, silently asking him how to proceed. He knew what _he_ would do, but ultimately it was Richard’s decision. Guy was momentarily incapacitated and Marian was in no immediate danger. He was back to thinking rationally –back to following orders. But, as it turned out, the King’s idea was pretty much the same as his.

Nodding slightly, he signalled that he may do as he wished. He had earned the right to put on a little show.

The smile that appeared on Robin’s features was wider than it had been in months.

He didn’t act right away. First he took a deep breath and released it slowly, riding his mind and his soul of every worry and every doubt. He wouldn’t appear before his friends and enemies as a quivering mess. He would hide his feelings, as he was so good at doing ever since he could remember. There would be plenty of time for coming undone later -he would sink to his knees and bare his soul before Marian and Much and any one of his friends who so required from him to forgive him. But he would not give Vaisey and Gisborne the satisfaction of knowing how damaged he truly was by their last scheme.

“You know, Gisborne, I am constantly appalled at your attempts at wooing,” he commented lightly, successful in his plan. He was confident that nobody but those intimately familiar with his heart would be able to guess his real feelings. “One moment you _say_ you love a woman and the next you try to go through her with a sword... Really, I’m curious, has that move ever worked?”

“Stay out of this,” Guy said, looking up and trying to find the source of the voice. He wasn’t the only one. Guards, peasants and outlaws alike all looked at every inch of the courtyard, trying to make sense of this latest development. Hidden as he was, they couldn’t see him. But he could see them and that helped to put him in the right frame of mind.

“And even if this _wasn’t_ the woman you have so often declared your love for,” Robin continued, enjoying himself more than he had expected. He had missed this... _lightness._ He had missed being someone other than King Richard’s most valuable asset. “-I don’t see why you would think it is okay to threaten a sweet, innocent –albeit _incredibly reckless_ – woman with your sword. That’s not very knightly of you.”

“She’s far from innocent!”

“She simply informed you that her affections lie with someone much more worthy of them; I hardly think that’s a crime...”

“Stay away from this!” Gisborne cried, suddenly realising that there was really no reason to be having this conversation in the first place. “This is none of your business!”

Robin laughed. A deep, menacing laugh that only a few of them could understand the meaning of. He turned violently to the side and shot another arrow in the man’s direction –causing another shot of pain to course along the left side of his body–, this time nearly hitting him on the leg. Guy flinched out of the way.

Enough was enough, it was time to show Gisborne who he was dealing with.

“Let’s think it over, shall we?” he said, and his voice sounded harsher now. “You went to the Holy Land and tried to kill the King, stabbing me in the process. You came back and you took over my lands and my title, which wouldn’t have been all that bad if you hadn’t treated my people like trash and allowed them to go hungry and die. You tried to get the woman I love to marry you under false pretences because you had the ridiculous idea that she would atone for your sins and then you burned down her house when she rejected you. You and your pal Vaisey struck a deal with the Black Knights to overthrow the King and then you went to the Holy Land –again– and you stabbed me – _also again_ . So, yeah, I don’t know about you, but _I_ would say that this whole thing _is my bloody business!_ ” his voice had been getting louder and louder with every statement and he was almost shouting by the last bit. Robin could tell that the angrier he got the harder it was to breathe, but he honestly didn’t care. For months he had carried this anger with him and it was high time he gave in to it.

Gisborne, whose face had been growing paler and paler as Robin’s voice grew louder, took a step back, horrified at the implications of such a voice. And he wasn’t the only one who looked like he was about to be sick. By this point all the fights had ceased long ago and pretty much everyone was looking wildly around themselves, trying to confirm that the suspicions that had risen in their minds were grounded –that Robin Hood was actually, _miraculously_ there. In Nottingham. Alive.

The outlaws, particularly the two who had seen Robin die, were understandably more surprised than the majority of the  people around them. Much, with his right knee firmly pressed against the Sheriff’s back to hold him in place, couldn’t keep his eyes from darting across the crowd, trying to see for himself that his master -his _best friend_ \- was truly among them. He was torn, because on the one hand he wanted him to be -desperately-, but he was certain that losing him again might actually destroy him. Allan turned to glare and Djaq, who was studiously ignoring him but was smiling nonetheless.

However it wasn’t Much who broke the deafening silence, or any of the outlaws for that matter. It wasn’t Marian or Guy or any of the several peasants from Locksley who had stayed in support of their King and, most importantly, their outlaws. No, it was someone else entirely.

“Gisborne, you complete and _utter_ fool!” Vaisey shouted angrily from the floor, startling Much who had all but forgotten about him. “You didn’t check, did you? You stabbed him and you left, all-so-proud of yourself thinking _‘Oh, I’m so strong! Oh, I killed Hood! Oh, I bet the pretty one will love me now!’_ Idiot! Now you’ve angered the beast!”

Nevermind the fact that Vaisey had checked himself that Hood was dead. He was too angry for self-reflection. Too _scared_. For the first time since he had been appointed Sheriff of Nottingham he was actually worried for his safety. Robin might not usually kill, but they had killed him first. There was no telling what he would do to them, especially since he had the king on his side.

The young lord laughed as he climbed down the stairs on his way to the courtyard, dropping his cloak as he went. Vaisey's discomfort was obvious and Robin relished that. He deserved it. However, he was the only one who found any humour in the situation. The courtyard was eerily quiet after the Sheriff's outburst.

“That’s not Hood; that _cannot_ be Hood!” Guy cried at last, trying to ignore the several pair of eyes that were fixed upon him. “He couldn’t have survived such a wound. _Believe me_. It’s impossible.”

“Stranger things have happened,” Robin commented from a much, _much_ closer position. He was at the gallery that surrounded the courtyard now, standing just shy of the sunlight. He was close enough that he could hear Marian's sharp intake of breath as she felt his presence just behind her. It was the only sound she had made since his big reveal and Robin wanted nothing more than to go to her, gather her in his arms and rid her of whatever thoughts and doubts were plaguing her. But he couldn't, he reminded himself. Not yet. Gisborne had to be dealt with first.

 _Give me two minutes_ , he silently urged her in his mind. _Two minutes and I will be yours to do as you please._

“ _NO!_ ” Guy insisted. “No-one would have been able to survive such a wound!”

“You know... Some people have called me stubborn,” the young man said lightly, stepping slowly into the light. “Of course, I prefer to think of myself as _driven._ ”

There was a sharp gasp from somewhere in the crowd as Robin came finally into view. Those who knew him well could tell he looked paler and thinner than before, but no-one cared at that moment because he also looked like himself –he looked like Robin and he was alive and oh my god how was this even possible! There were also a few metal clacks as swords were dropped on both sides of the fight and a few curses –many of them courtesy of Allan himself, who seemed to be the only out of Robin’s old gang who could do anything besides stare.

Robin stood tall for a moment, a cheeky grin on his face as he looked around the courtyard and locked eyes with each and every one of his friends for the first time in months. The anger he had predicted they  would feel was absent, or perhaps it was simply buried under an array of different emotions. Much’s eyes were wide with an almost childlike wonder, unshed tears welling up in front of his blue irises, making them look even brighter than usual. Allan, usually so carefree and ready to face any and all eventualities, looked completely stunned. His jaw was hanging opened and he wore an expression he had probably never worn before -like he was completely out of sorts and didn’t know which way was up. From his position at the gate, John fixed his young friend with a look no different than how a father would look at his naughty child. Out of instinct, Robin sent him a wink and a smile and the corner of the older man’s mouth twitched ever-so-slightly.

Okay, so John would _probably_ not want to kill him, the young lord reasoned. _One down, three to go._

“Whatever you think happened, I didn’t have anything to do with it,” Vaisey said defensively, still from the floor. Funnily enough, as scared as he was, he was probably the least surprised out of the whole crowd. Yes, Hood’s sudden reappearance was certainly shocking, because up until three minutes ago he had been beyond certain that he was dead. _But,_ at the same time, it was the only thing that made any kind of sense. How else would have the king managed to make it across half of England without being found out by _anyone_? Hood was the only one Vaisey knew who could walk through walls, so it was logical that he would be implicated. He had to be.

Besides, he thought to himself, it was possible that for once Locksley’s interference might actually work in his favour. If he and Gisborne fought –and, let’s be honest, there was not a doubt in his mind that they would fight– there was every chance his role (Vaisey’s) in the whole matter would be swept to the side for the moment. Maybe, just maybe, he would be able to escape this in one piece.

“I’ll deal with you later,” Robin informed him.

“Take your time, I’m not in a hurry.”

“Gisborne, I suggest you surrender your weapons now, or we will not be responsible for what happens next,” the King said as Robin rolled his eyes at the Sheriff’s lame attempt at humour. But Gisborne didn’t hear him –couldn’t possibly hear him, caught up as he was by the sight before him.

“You can’t be here.”

“And yet I am.”

“You should be dead!”

“Many times over,” Robin replied automatically, as he had so often done before everything went to hell.

The familiar taunt seemed to somehow snap Gisborne out of his stupor. His eyes never leaving Robin’s, he bent down and picked up his sword, wincing as he did so.

“I don’t know _how_ you did it, Hood,” he practically spat the name, “but this ends today.”

“I agree. There are only so many times one can return from the dead before it starts to get a bit old,” Robin answered calmly, balancing his own sword in his hands.

“There will be no returning after this,” Gisborne said menacingly. “I’ll make sure this time. I’ll cut you into little pieces if I must.”

“You can try, I guess...”

The fight that ensued was fierce, but not at all up to either man’s standards. They were both severely injured –Gisborne’s right shoulder was badly hurt, so he swung his sword with his left hand, while Robin was still healing from the injury that had nearly sent him to his grave. He was also exhausted, having slept very little since leaving Acre and his latest display of liveliness had taken a bigger toll on him than he was willing to admit. But they were both too stubborn to back down, and there was a lot in the balance: England, Locksley, _Marian_ -not necessarily in that order. Today was the day for the final showdown -either one or both of them would die. There was no more room for games.

The sound of their swords clashing in the air and their grunts when they moved to avoid being hit were the only thing that broke the stillness of the early afternoon. Peasants, guards, outlaws and knights -there was no distinction as every pair of eyes followed the pair’s every move.

“Are you really so naïve as to think that you can just waltz back into Nottingham and everything is going to be fine?” Gisborne sneered at Robin as they circled each other some time later.

The younger man laughed, because it was so ridiculous that Gisborne should think that he hadn’t already considered what he was coming back to.

“ _Naïve_ ? Do you honestly believe that I don’t know _exactly_ what I’m coming home to? I know what I did –trust me, I do. I know what staying behind meant and what I had to sacrifice to be here right now,” he paused and he shot a quick look in Richard’s direction. The King returned that look with a small nod as an assurance that he would make sure his sacrifice wasn’t in vain. “But I will work things out, because I’m _here_. I’m back. And I have right on my side –I’ve brought the King back.”

The words echoed in both Robin’s and Marian’s minds – _We find Lardner, we bring the King home and then we get married_ – and she made a small, almost imperceptible sound -a whimper full of hope. He turned instinctively towards her, his eyes full of apologies and promises.

 _I'm sorry, I love you,_ he cried inside his head, willing her to believe him. She did, somehow. She could see his heart and soul, his pain and his terror. His feelings, usually so guarded, were now in full display and she knew every little secret he had ever tried to hide.

She wanted to reply. She wanted to shout at the top of her lungs that she did too -that she hated what he had done and what he had put her through, but that she loved _him_. All of him -the good and the bad. She wanted nothing more than to jump right into his arms and allow herself to be held.

However, life had other plans for them.

She caught the slight movement Gisborne made and her eyes grew wider still. She watched helplessly as his long fingers curled around the hilt of his sword and he raised his arm, ready to deliver the fatal blow.

“ _Robin_...”

She had meant to shout it, but her lungs felt constricted and she was unable to give that one word enough force as she would have liked. It was enough, though. The young nobleman turned around just in time to see Gisborne’s sword coming down on him. He jumped out of the way at the last second, but his body felt heavy and he wasn’t quick enough, so the blade ended up catching him in the arm. He howled in pain and his sword slipped from his hand.

It was as if all his strength left his body the moment the metal crashed against the cold stone steps. He fell to his knees, his breaths uneven and both his arms wrapped tightly around his body to try to keep at least some of the pain at bay.

“I’m going to enjoy doing this,” the dark-haired man said almost franticly as he neared him, a maniac glint in his blue eyes and sword at the ready.

Robin forced himself to meet his enemy eye, but not before he had taken a quick survey of his surroundings. Gisborne seemed to be the only one left standing, and both his friends and the king were far enough from him that it was unlikely he could do much damage to them.

Good, that was good.

“If you’re going to kill me just get on with it,” the outlaw challenged. He was exhausted and dying didn’t bother him all that much if it meant he could get some rest. And if everyone else was safe.

The whole courtyard was silent as they watched Guy taking the final steps towards everybody’s favourite noble. King Richard could do nothing but stare, for he was too far from his friend to go to his rescue and there were too many people between them for him to get a clear shot. There wasn’t anything _anyone_ could do but wait, though it seemed only a miracle would save Robin now.

But there was no miracle. Instead there was a young girl who placed herself between the two men she had sort of loved at different points in her life.

Hearing Robin's voice from the battlements had sunk Marian in a pit of despair; seeing him now -knelt before Gisborne, unarmed and helpless-, finally brought her back.

She would be having quite a conversation with Robin. And Djaq. She even had a few words for King Richard, if she got the chance.

But first things first.

Two steps were all that took her to close the distance between her and the two men. She placed herself before Robin, close enough that she could feel the heat of his body, arms wide open as if to shield him from view.

“Marian, get out of the way,” Guy all but shrieked.

“If you want to kill him, you will have to kill me first,” she said resolutely.

“Marian, please, don’t be an idiot. _Move_ ,” Robin tried to reason, but it was useless –he already knew this. Once Marian got an idea inside her head -however ill-conceived that idea might be-, she would see it to the end.

“No,” she said again, glancing over her shoulder to look at him. “I’m not going to let him kill you again. I’d sooner die.”

“And what help would that be to anyone?,” he challenged. His breath was ragged, but he was smiling faintly. Whatever might happen next, he cherished this moment with her. Dying was worth it if he could do so looking into her eyes.

“Dead men don't get a say in what I do!,” she declared and Robin almost burst out laughing because it was such a ridiculous statement.

But it wasn't a laughing matter, not by a long shot. Here Marian stood, willing to sacrifice her life _for him_.

Not funny at all.

It was one thing to give his own life for the sake of his King and country. He had made the choice eight  years ago to follow Richard to the Holy Land, so now his life belonged to his liege. It had been his choice and his alone. He could regret it, but he couldn't undo it. But Marian had made no such promise, nor had Robin agreed to let anything happen to her in the name of the so-called greater good. He would gladly die for England, but he would be damned before he let anything happen to Marian for the same cause.

She _had to_ live -even if no one else did.

However, there was very little he could do at this point. He was exhausted, he could barely move and his sword laid out of reach. Gisborne’s arm was already raised, his sword ready to deliver the fatal blow. Robin could only watch helplessly as he prayed for Marian to see reason and move out of the way.

And then something amazing happened –or maybe not so amazing, because really, it should have been obvious by now that Much would simply not sit idly by while his Master’s life –or Marian’s for the matter, because at this point both things were pretty much the same thing– hanged in the balance.

“Master!” he called loudly, surprising even himself.

Robin called upon every ounce of strength he had left in his body and turned his head in Much’s direction. And then he saw it: his sword –his actual sword, the one that was every bit as part of him as his own arms, not the one he had been using, inherited from some poor soul who hadn’t been as lucky as him and hadn’t made it out of the desert alive– was flying towards him.

Something snapped into place then for Robin of Locksley.

Later, when he thinks back on this moment, he will only remember flashes.

He would remember stretching his good arm and catching his sword in his left hand.

He would remember pushing Marian out of the way -rather ungentlemanly, she would remind him.

He would remember seeing Gisborne charging towards him.

He would not remember getting to his feet, but he would remember Guy and him suddenly engaged in a kind of embrace, each supporting the other's weight.

He would remember Marian's terrified expression, and the wrenched _“No!”_ she cried when she saw Gisborne's sword disappearing from view.

He would remember stepping back and locking eyes with Gisborne for the last time.

He would remember the pain, and then he would remember nothing more.

That was when darkness overtook him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://writerladymarianne.blogspot.com/


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Words can't even begin to describe how thankful I am for each and every single person who has taken the time to read and review this story. I'm going through some personal stuff, and I mean it when I say that the love and support I get from the fandom is one of the few things that are keeping me going.
> 
> I hope you'll enjoy chapter 8. Is not as action-packed as chapter 7, but it's necesary to keep the story going. FYI, chapter 9 is a flashback that will take us back to the Holy Land and we'll see what happened to our dear Robin. 
> 
> I'll talk to you in the comments. Have a good fortnight!

**CHAPTER VIII.**

He awoke to the sound of someone calling his name.

_ Odd _ , he thought. His fellow travellers had tried not to use his given name if possible, just in case it was overheard by the wrong set of ears and their whole plan was compromised. But this person, whoever it was, was calling his name, rather forcefully and insistently, he might add. Why they were doing said thing, he couldn’t tell. Nor could he tell when he had fallen asleep, though going on by how exhausted he felt it must have been a relatively short while ago. All he knew for certain was that he was tired beyond words and he wished that this person would leave him alone. Whatever they needed him for, he was sure that someone else could deal with it for once. 

“Robin!” the voice called again, more forcefully this time, and he felt his body being shaken slightly. “Open your eyes!”

He wanted to tell the voice to quit bothering him, but he felt strangely disconnected from his body.

“Robin!”

“I’m not being funny, but he looks dead,” a different voice observed –a voice that sounded oddly familiar for some reason. Also, the words it had uttered made him want to smile –or would have, if he could remember how to do so.

“He’s not dead! He  _ can’t  _ be dead,” a third voice said angrily, but with a distinctively panicky strain to it. “He isn’t, is he?” it added, a little uncertainly this time.

“Of course he’s not,” the first voice said -a female voice, he noted suddenly. And heavily accented. “He’s just tired, Much. He’s pushed himself way past his limits today.”

_ Much _ ... He knew someone by that name. It reminded him of the forest and songs and food.

“Well, I’ll say! I heard coming back from the dead can be quite tiring,” the second voice commented lightly, though there seemed to be some harshness underneath the casual tone. 

“Allan,  _ shut up _ !” Much hissed threateningly. “This is  _ so _ not a joke!”

The familiar banter finally did it for him and the faces of two of his dearest friends came back to him quite suddenly. 

Reality came crashing down on him like a pile of bricks.

He was back.

He was in Nottingham. 

The sun blinded him when his eyes shot opened and he blinked a few times to adjust to the sudden light. Djaq’s worried face hovering over him was the first thing he discerned, but he couldn’t have cared less about her -not after hearing those voices just two seconds ago. 

“There you are,” the Saracen said, smiling in relief. “You had us worried for a minute.”

He ignored her.

“Djaq, where...” he began to ask, his eyes already darting wildly in search of his friends. They had to be there -he had just heard them! He needed to see them –to talk to them. He needed to make things right again. 

Before he could fully form the question in his mind, let alone voice it, the King appeared in his line of vision, effectively putting an end to his efforts.

“How is he doing?” he asked Djaq, ignoring the young man’s annoyed expression.

“I’m not sure yet. He doesn’t seem to be badly injured, but I’ll have to take a look to make sure he hasn’t caused more damage to his previous wound.”

“Very well. Take him to the great hall –I’ve instructed everyone to meet there so we can figure out what our next move should be. You,” he added, turning to address someone behind him. “Find bandages and clean water and everything else you think could be used to treat the wounded.”

“Can you stand, Robin?”

The man tried to sit down –if only to get a better look at his surroundings–, but as he did so a sharp pain coursed through the upper part of his body and he winced in pain and he collapsed back on the floor, his fingers instinctively finding his old scar and pressing tightly against it.

Djaq was still trying to figure out how she could help him when a deep voice was heard from somewhere in the crowd. 

“Here, let me.” A moment later, a large figure had stepped forward and grabbed Robin by his good arm, supporting much of his weight. 

The young man craned his neck slightly and came face to face with Little John. 

“I did promise you that I'd be back, didn't I?” he said hoarsely, with a small smile playing at his lips. He might be in pain, but he was still himself, so there was no way he would pass on an opportunity to tease one of his friends. Also, his familiar face brought a wave of relief unlike anything he had felt in a while. 

“Shut up, Robin,” John replied, his upper lip twitching slightly. 

Together they took him to the great hall and laid him on a table so that Djaq could take a better look. Robin drifted in and out of awareness as the Saracen woman carried her examination. He did notice when the guard returned, his arms full of whatever he could carry out of the medicine cabinet, and also that John seemed to have vanished as soon as he was in place. 

“Everything seems to be in order. The cut in your arm is fairly deep, so you’ll need stitches, but you’ve come back from worse,” Djaq declared eventually, and Robin made a conscious effort to concentrate on her.

“Djaq, I’m- Ouch!” she ignored his complaint and continued sewing him up. “I’m fine,” he tried again between stitches. He wasn’t, of course. Every inch of him hurt and he was tired beyond words. Keeping his eyes opened was hard enough, breathing was a much greater task than it had been for weeks now and he honestly couldn’t imagine how he was even supposed to sit, let alone stand. But none of that even compared to his overwhelming desire to meet with his friends. He’d crawl if he had to, but he couldn’t just stay here. He needed to go to them –they  _ had _ to know the whole truth.

“Oh, yes. You look absolutely fine,” Djaq commented sarcastically as she worked on his arm. No way was she going to let him fool her –she knew him too well.

The King returned before Robin could shoot her with one of his snarky replies.

“How is he doing?” he asked, ignoring the young nobleman once again, much to his dismay. He hated being talked about as if he weren’t laying  _ right there _ .

“He’ll live,” she answered distractedly. “But he needs to rest. He’s pushed himself today and he’s never going to get better if he doesn’t take things easy.”

“Fine, I will...” he began to say, hoping the two of them would at least acknowledge his presence. 

They didn’t.

“Can you make sure he does?” 

Djaq stopped her sewing and looked up to meet King Richard’s eyes.

“I could arrange for something,” she replied carefully. “But he’s not going to like it.”

Robin knew all too well what  _ something _ meant. Back in the Holy Land, he had had some trouble accepting the fact that he was bedridden for a while and Djaq had had to resort to her Saracen knowledge to make sure he got the rest he needed. But that simply wouldn’t do right now! 

“What? Come on, Djaq, I’m  _ fine _ !”

“You heard what she said: you need to get your strength back if you are to be the good and caring Lord of Locksley you’re supposed to be,” Richard reminded the young man. His eyes were kind when he finally looked at him, but his expression was firm. This was an order, even if it didn’t sound like one. (Funnily enough, he hadn’t spared on thought on Locksley yet; he had more pressing matters to worry about for now). “Sleep. Rest. Get better. Everything will be waiting for you when you wake.”

“And Vaisey?” 

“In the dungeons, guarded by Sir Frederick himself. All the guards are in this room and our men are keeping a tight eye on them, should they try to do anything stupid –though I don’t see why they would, since they haven’t tried anything before. Sir Guy is dead,” he added, guessing his young friend’s following question.

“And my men?”

“I just saw them outside trying to put the crowd at ease. I imagine they should be done with that by now and they’ll be waiting to hear from you. I don’t anticipate they’ll go anywhere for a while, but I’ll keep an eye on them just in case.”

“I’ll talk to them,” Djaq offered, mixing some herbs in a small vase.

“You have to tell them the truth,” the former leader of the outlaws said in a rush, turning to look at his friend. “They have to know that I had no idea that I was going to survive when I sent them back to England. Please, they have to understand that I  _ never  _ meant for them to be hurt –that the idea of them in any kind of pain has been killing me for months and that I was terrified that something could have happened to them while I was gone. I should have been here, and I wasn’t and I hate myself when I think of everything they must have gone through...”

His green eyes were pleading as he tried to convey the right emotions for her friend to pass along. It was rare that he would open up so much to anyone, but his defences were low after everything he had gone through and gaining forgiveness was much more important than keeping up appearances that nothing ever bothered him.

“They know,” the woman told him, lovingly stroking his cheek. “This isn’t your fault, Robin. They know it.” 

“Please, just–” He was too exhausted to say anything else. Richard gave Djaq a small nod and together they made sure Robin drank every last drop of her concoction.

He was fast asleep within the minute.

King Richard called upon two of the knights that had come with them from the Holy Land and instructed them to take Robin into one of the rooms and keep watch over him for a while. Only when they were gone did the woman allow herself to relax and she frowned when she did.

Though she had told Robin she was sure the outlaws would forgive him eventually, she wasn’t anticipating the talk they were going to have to be easy. Besides, as glad as they would be to have their leader back, the fact remained that they had thought him dead for an impossibly long time. They would need someone to blame for all the heartache they had endured and while Robin would surely have to shoulder some of that blame, Djaq was a far more suitable candidate. She had been the one to pronounce him dead at the scene; she had been the one who told them there was nothing else to be done and sent Much and Allan on their merry way. And she had been the one to bring him back behind their backs. 

No, Djaq was certainly not their favourite person right now and, quite frankly she didn’t know if there was anything she could say to change their minds.

“I could talk with them if you’d like,” the King offered, guessing what was going on through her mind.

“No, they should hear it from me. It’s only fair.”

“It’s not your fault either,” he reminded her. “What happened... No one could have predicted that he would survive the wound, let alone live long enough to make it back. You did everything in your power. Robin knows that, and I’m sure your friends will know that too.”

Djaq didn’t feel like pointing out that if she had realised right away that Robin was still alive, she could have saved Much and Allan –and consequently everyone else– much of their heartache. 

“I should go now. Unless you need me here?”

“No. Go. You’ve earned a break from all of this. Check on him, though, and make sure he comes to see me when he awakes.”

“It’s probably going to be a few hours,” she warned.

“I’ll wait. I’m not going anywhere just yet.”

Djaq nodded in agreement and left the hall in search of her friends.

She found Will as he was making his way back from the dungeons, where he had made sure Vaisey was safely locked up in a cell. She quickly informed him of the task Robin had charged her with.

“They’ll be so mad...” she finished with a sigh.

“They’ll be happy too.”

“Not at me. I  _ told _ Much and Allan that he was dead. I sent them back to England thinking that it was all over. And then, when I came back, I didn’t tell them either! They’ll hate me!” Not a day had gone back when she hadn’t thought of Much’s tortured expression as she pulled him from Robin’s seemingly lifeless body.

“Hey!” he said kindly, gathering her in his arms. “Hey! Stop that. You did what you could and  _ you saved Robin’s life _ . They’ll come to see that too, eventually. I promise you.”

“Yes,  _ eventually... _ ”

* * *

“I’m just going to come out and say it,” Kate announced suddenly, breaking the eerie silence of the courtyard. The peasants were gone, the guards were gone. Some of the King’s men remained, moving across the gallery on their way to and fro the great hall, but they paid them no mind. It was just the six of them there. 

Kate sat on the stone steps of Nottingham castle, sandwiched between Luke and Allan. John stood not far behind them, leaning heavily against his staff, keeping an eye on both the courtyard and the castle. 

They were perfectly still, all but Much, who seemed to be bursting with spare energy and was pacing frantically the length of the stone steps, his face stony and pale. But none was more still that Marian, who sat in the exact spot where she had landed after being shoved out of the way by Robin. She hadn’t moved an inch -not even when Robin collapsed, or when he was taken away. She had  _ tried to _ move, but her mind and her body were entirely disconnected. Her mind was reeling, and she had a few questions she wanted answers to, but for the moment she could do nothing but sit there, waiting for her body to finally cooperate with her.

Kate’s words were the first ones any of them had uttered in quite some time. After Robin had been taken back to the castle, John had returned to find his friends pretty much in the same state they had been a few minutes before, apparently too stunned to do much. The older man had understood how they felt, because he himself wasn’t doing much better. But there was a reason why Robin had chosen him as his successor: confused as he obviously was, he had enough sense to recognize that there were a few things that needed to be done before he had the luxury of breaking down. And so it was that he had taken charge of the situation and ordered the gang to deal with the bewildered crowd. So the outlaws -or most of them anyway- had spent quite some time talking to the peasants, offering more comfort than actual answers, as they had very little idea of what had happened. 

Eventually, the peasants had agreed to go back to their respective villages, confident that the outlaws would deal with everything and then pass along all the information they needed. After they were gone, the gang had spent another while nursing the minor wounds they had acquired during the latest confrontation -mostly minor scrapes and shallow cuts- and finally sank into their current positions, determined to wait for as long as it took for the explanation they were most certainly owed.

None of them had felt much like talking, so they hadn’t. Until Kate finally snapped. 

“Please don’t,” Luke pleaded, pressing his hands to his temples. “I can’t go through this just now –I have a terrible headache and I would rather you waited before opening Pandora’s Box.”

She ignored him, as usual. “No, really, I have to know,” she turned to look at Allan. “Didn’t you say Robin of Locksley was dead?”

Luke had been right to predict that Kate’s words would have consequences. Her question unlocked something within her friends, especially the two of them whose last image of Robin was laying dead in the desert.

Allan turned his clear eyes and glared in her direction. Deep down he knew that the girl’s question was fair, but he resented the accusation nonetheless. 

“Did I say that? Why, I wonder where I could have gotten that idea from,” he spat sarcastically. 

“But he was!” Much cried before Kate could tell Allan not to start anything with her because it was not her fault that his friend had just come back from the dead. He threw his arms in the air in frustration. “We were there, we saw it! For Christ sake, we even buried him!”

Much’s words brought back a certain memory to Allan and his expression became distant. He could see it with his mind’s eye: the desert, two bodies, one half-dug grave...

“ _ Well _ ...” 

“Well, what?!” 

“We didn’t, technically,” Allan reasoned slowly. “Bury him, I mean,” he explained, coming out from the daze and fixing his eyes on Much’s suddenly still form.

“What are you talking about, of course we did!” his friend said exasperatedly. He was in no mood to deal with Allan being... well, Allan. “We took him to the grave-diggers’ tent, we waited until the grave was done and then we–” he paused, his eyes wide in horror as the same realisation hit him. “Sweet mother of god, we didn’t bury him!”

“What?” Luke asked curiously. John leaned forward on his staff and even Marian blinked once and turned slightly towards the group. “What happened?”

“We wanted to stay, obviously,” Allan began, somehow defensively. He had a hunch that at least one person would try to blame them for Robin’s fake death and he wasn’t going to have any of that. He was all about owning up to his mistakes when he made them, but he wasn’t going to pay for something that was certainly not his fault. “Much was the most vocal about it –said he couldn’t leave until he knew his master was properly put to rest–, but we all agreed. He was our friend too, you know... But the grave wasn’t done yet, and they also had to dig Carter’s, so it got late and the King said we should all go back to the camp and let the men handle Robin. He said everything would be done properly and that we needn’t worry. We ended up agreeing, because the desert is no place to be wandering around at night, and really, there wasn’t much point in staying either. So we...”

“We left,” Much finished breathlessly. “He was  _ alive _ and we left him there. Alone.”

“It’s not as if we knew, Much, did we? Djaq said he was done for, and honestly, he looked pretty done for to me.”

“He was  _ alive _ , Allan. Do you understand that? He was alive and we just left him there to rot. Oh, God. I think I’m going to be sick. Oh, God; oh, God; oh, God...” He resumed his pacing at an even greater speed, one hand clasped firmly against his mouth as if he honestly believed that something other than words might come out of it. 

For months Much had tried to convince himself that leaving Robin alone in the desert had been the right choice because there wasn’t anything he could have possibly done for him anymore. It hadn’t been easy –to this day he still woke up thinking that it had all been his fault, that he should have been there for Robin– but he was finally in a place where he could at least live with his decision. But now... Now Robin was alive and Much had just left him there and why had no-one told him of this before?!

“Much...”

The word came out so softly that at first no-one heard it. Marian had to call his name several times before she finally got his attention. 

Allan’s revelation was like lighting a candle inside a dark room. Nothing had made a lick of sense before -Robin had come back from the dead and Marian could not see how that was even possible. Was this some kind of heretical magic or had Allan and Much simply been lying to her for months? She couldn’t believe the latter, but the former seemed just as unlikely. Everything changed, though, with this new piece of information: her friends hadn’t actually seen Robin being put in the ground -they had been told that he would be buried, but they hadn’t been there to watch. A lot of things still didn’t make sense, but at least she had some vague idea of what had happened. 

Robin had not died -simple as that.

She would have to have a conversation with Djaq, because the Saracen had looked her in the eye and blatantly lied to her face, but first things first.

“Much!” she called again, louder than before. Five pairs of eyes turned to look at her with varying degrees of curiosity. The former servant looked horrified, as if he had forgotten that she was there and was only just realizing his mistake.

Marian got to her feet, her limbs protesting slightly after the long span of inactivity. She walked slowly towards her friend, her blue eyes shining with a light that had been absent from them for months. 

“He’s alive.” The words sounded as if they were ripped from the bottom of her very heart, but they seemed to have no effect on the young man, who continued to stare at her with tortured eyes. 

Seeing this, she continued, drawing closer to him and gathering both his hands in hers. 

“Don’t you see it?” she asked, smiling like she hadn’t done in what felt like a lifetime. “ _ Robin. Is. Alive. _ ”

Only when he heard it like that -when he saw the empty shell of a woman she had been for so long transforming back into the girl he had known for most of his life-,  did he understand what she was trying to say.

So he hadn’t been there for Robin. Robin had been hurt and he hadn’t been there to help him; he had  _ died  _ and he couldn’t save him. Much would never be able to forgive himself, because it had been his  _ job  _ to keep his master safe and he had failed miserably. Except that now... Robin wasn’t dead. He was here now; he had come back. He was  _ alive _ and he was  _ here _ and at the end of the day that was all that mattered. 

“Robin is alive,” he breathed. “He’s alive. He really is alive.”

Not even on his wildest dreams had he allowed himself to think of the possibility, knowing his heart wouldn’t be strong enough to lose his friend again.

They smiled at each other, the first real smile each of them had sported in months and months.

“What are you two going on about?” Kate asked them, confused. Of course she didn’t understand –only those who had the most important person in their lives torn from their side much too early could understand the joy of having them back.

“Robin is alive,” Marian said again, her smile growing impossibly wider every time she said the words. “I thought –we all thought that that was it. That he was gone and that we would never get to see him again. But he  _ is here _ . He is alive.  _ He came back _ .”

Her excitement was contagious and she eventually got Allan and John to smile back at her when it dawned on them that she was right: there would be plenty of time to wonder and ask questions, but the single most important thing right now was that Robin was  _ alive _ .

“You’re not mad then?” John asked curiously. He had been mildly worried that Marian would react with anger and she would try to engage Robin in one of their famous arguments, one for which he was obviously not ready. It wouldn’t be the first time that something like that happened: the first time that Robin had returned from the Holy Land, it had taken Marian weeks to even begin to admit that she was anything but furious at him. But she was older and wiser now. 

“ _ Mad _ ?” she snorted. That wasn’t a big enough word to describe what she was feeling. “I’m livid! I will never, for as long as I live, forgive Robin for what he put me through.” Her tone didn’t quite match her words, though and the smile didn’t leave her face at any time. “I’m mad and confused and a little terrified that this is all a dream. But, above everything else, I’m  _ happy _ . Happier than I’ve been in months, and it’s all because of him. He is here, and for the moment that is all I care about. There will be plenty of time for me to murder him when he is feeling better.”

The conversation that she would eventually have with Robin was sure to include a number of strong words, of that she had no doubt. Her anger would certainly make an appearance at some point, obviously, and she knew enough about Robin to be certain that he wouldn’t answer the questions she had for him to her satisfaction. But all of that was a problem for another time. For now, though, –for that one second– the only thing she cared about was that he was alive. For months that had been all she had dreamt about and now her dream had come true. She wasn’t about to question how that had come to be.

_ For now _ .

Will and Djaq found them in a much better mood than they had expected them to be. They were all smiling and there was a certain lightness that the woman hadn’t seen in them for the past two days. That lightness, however, somewhat disappeared when they felt them nearing. 

Allan spotted them first and marched in their direction, his eyes shining with anger and betrayal and  _ maybe _ a little bit of amusement. His hand curled up in a fist on its own accord and he was about to unleash months of pent-up emotions in one punch against one of those he held responsible for such emotions, when he realised that this was  _ Djaq _ , of all people. 

Now, Allan A Dale may have done some things he wasn’t particularly proud of. He had lied, he had gotten into fights. He had even killed, occasionally, when he had to. But he had never – _ ever _ – punched a girl and Djaq, even with her short hair and her baggy clothes, was still a girl. So he changed course at the last second, and his fist collided against Will’s cheek instead.

“Hey!” the young man cried indignantly. 

“Allan!”

“You said he was dead,” Allan reminded them, his eyes shifting from one to the other. 

“I know! I know what I said and I’m  _ sorry _ ! I never thought...”

“What did you do, go back to him when we weren’t looking?” Much asked, coming to stand next to his friend. He felt more betrayed than angry, because really  _ he _ of all people should have known that Robin was alive and the fact that no-one had thought of telling him hurt more than he could say with words. But, unlike Allan, he was too exhausted to do anything more than demand an explanation. 

“Of course we didn’t!” Will replied angrily, rubbing his sore cheek. “You know us better than that!”

“When we left for the King’s Camp –and even later, when you two left for the port... We thought he was dead.  _ I _ thought he was dead. I never  _ imagined _ he could have survived losing so much blood –he  _ shouldn’t have survived _ . It’s a miracle he did –and it’s even a greater miracle that someone noticed. He could have easily been buried and died a far worse death than the one we thought he did.”

“We didn’t know. Not for a week,” Will added, guessing their next question. “We tried to tell you – _ I  _ went after you– but you were already gone.”

“A week?” Marian asked inquisitively, voicing what the others were also thinking. They hadn’t been expecting that. Had Robin been alone for a whole week, fighting his way back to life?

Clearly, there had to be more to the story than what met the eye.

“Explain,” John commanded. “ _ Everything _ .”

Djaq sighed and nodded.

“Sit down,” Will said. “It’s going to be a long story.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://writerladymarianne.blogspot.com/


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Out of the blue update; yay!
> 
> There are two reasons for this: one, a lot of you have told me that you needed more time because it's summer, and apparently you are all currently down at the beach somewhere and needed more time to read chapter 8. That is why this chapter is coming much later than the others.
> 
> The second reason (which explains why I'm not posting this over the weekend as I've been doing lately) is because I'm currently facing a crisis of atomic proportions at work, and my future is a bit uncertain. I've decided to post chapter 9 now because I honestly don't know what my life will be like over the next few days and weeks. I want to get this out of the way and focus on the final two chapters as soon as I can. For some reason (stress, probably) I'm having trouble planning ahead, so I feel that I need to post a chapter before I can work on the next one. Don't worry, though. I will still try to post chapter 10 within the next 2 or 3 weeks, and chapter 11 in about a month or 6 weeks. I won't drop everything down on you at once.
> 
> As usual, don't feel pressured if you can't read this at once. Enjoy your summer. Though I can't say that I envy you _per se_ (I loathe the summer; give me winter every time), I admit that I miss the calmness that the summer break usually brings. So think of me when you are enjoying the perks of the summer, and drop me a line if you want to warm my heart.
> 
> Love you all!

**CHAPTER IX.**

It was just after dawn when the men woke up. This was not unusual for either of them, as the extreme weather in the desert -too hot during the day and too cold at night- made it impossible for them to work at any other time. An early raising was what they had been doing for years.

Not for a while, though. King Richard had been talking peace with Saladin for a few weeks, so fights had become less frequent. Fewer fights had meant fewer deaths, and fewer deaths had meant less work for the gravediggers.

That had changed, however, the day before.

Everything about that day had been unexpected. The sudden appearance of King Richard himself, surrounded by a group of men neither of them had ever seen and a Saracen woman had shocked them beyond words. Carter’s death had also been without warning, and Robin’s even more so.

They had both been in the Holy Land for a long time, so they had both heard of Robin of Locksley, had even talked to him a few times –the guy had told the best stories and his good humour had made him fun to be around, even if they were in the middle of a war in a faraway land. They had heard great stories _about_ him too, including the one time when he had almost single-handedly prevented a Saracen attack on the King, nearly getting himself killed in the process but ultimately being sent home for his efforts.

Neither of them had been able to understand how he had suddenly gotten himself back in the Holy Land. Dead. No explanation had been given and propriety had prevented them from asking the King directly. They had simply been instructed to dig two graves and that’s what they had hastily set out to do.

Four people had come with the King, each more heartbroken than the last one. One of the gravediggers had recognised Much, Robin’s manservant, as the one who had sat silently cradling Robin to his chest, and his curiosity had peaked even more.

Progress had been made very, very slowly, and by the time the sun had begun to set they had been only halfway through the first grave.

The King, who had uncharacteristically stayed throughout the process, had eventually suggested they all went back to their camp. This, of course, had been vehemently resisted at first by the whole party, but as soon as it had been made clear to them that they wouldn’t be able to make their way through the desert at night and that they simply couldn’t all stay in that little tent the gravediggers had for themselves, they had had no choice but agree, however reluctantly, and follow their King. They had said goodbye to their friend –long, tearful goodbyes that had made all of them uncomfortable to watch– and they had left.

King Richard himself had addressed both gravediggers directly before leaving and instructed them to take care of both bodies immediately, since the two men who had died that day were heroes that deserved to be put to rest honourably.

They had finished the first grave shortly before midnight and mutely agreed to take care of the other one in the morning. A night, they thought, would make no difference to either man’s eternal sleep.

They had chosen to bury Carter first, simply because he had been the closest to the open grave, nothing else. They would both come to be very thankful for that choice. They had moved the other body into their little tent to protect him from vultures and gone to bed.

So, the next day, they both woke up early and set to work. When they deemed the grave to be deep enough, they flipped a coin to decide which one of them would have to do all the heavy lifting and bring the body to its final resting spot.

The youngest of the two men grunted and complained as he walked back into their little home, not looking forward to the difficult task that awaited him. He had had to move enough bodies in the past couple of years to know how complicated a task it was to be done without help, but his companion simply chuckled as he watched him go.

As soon as he grabbed Robin’s wrist, he knew that something was amiss, though he couldn’t say exactly what it was at first. It just felt different for some reason. It took him a moment to realise that the skin that met his fingers was much warmer than he had expected it to be, and when he did, he let go of the arm in surprise. He was even _more_ surprised when the limb in question fell limply to the ground, as, in his experience, dead bodies didn’t move quite so easily, especially not the ones that had been dead for as long as this one.

After a moment of hesitation, he called after his companion to come and take a look, but the man would not hear of it.

“Oh, no. I know what you’re trying to do. You want me to go there to help you. Well, that’s not going to happen.”

“I don’t think I can move him,” the young man insisted.

“Well, you’re going to have to figure out a way to do it. He’s not _that_ heavy anyway.”

“I meant I don’t think we can bury him. I don’t think he’s dead.”

The older man thought he must have certainly heard him wrong, so it was a few moments before he could come up with a suitable comeback.

“Don’t be daft!”

“I’m not! I swear. Look!”

Knowing his companion well-enough to be sure that he would hold his ground until he relented and went to join him, the older man finally got to his feet and made his way towards the small tent, muttering angrily as he did.

“If this is all just a trick to get me to help you, I swear to God you’ll be sleeping outside tonight.”

The last part was said already inside their shelter, so he could see how unaffected his friend was by his threat.

“It’s not. Look,” the other gravedigger insisted.

The man kneeled before the young nobleman that was supposed to be buried by now. He certainly _looked_ dead –he was as pale as a corpse–, but he didn’t _feel_ dead. It was true that his skin was warm, perhaps even a touch too warm. A side of him wanted to argue that perhaps the heat of the day had warmed his skin a bit, but the rational part of him knew that even if it had been ten times hotter, it would be no excuse. Their little living arrangement was relatively unaffected by extreme temperatures, so there was no reason why a cold body would heat up again. Besides, even if they _could_ find an explanation to the heat, they definitely couldn’t explain why his body was still flaccid when he should be most certainly rigid by now.

No, there was definitely something very strange about this particular corpse.

The young man looked expectantly at his companion as he carried his examination, expecting him to tell him what to do.

“We can’t bury him,” he insisted after a while when it became clear his friend was stunned beyond words.

“I don’t know,” the older man replied carefully. “Even if he’s not dead right now, he’s going to be soon enough.”

“Maybe. Maybe not.”

“Oh, come on! Look at him!”

“Yeah, I’m looking! He should be dead, but he’s not. What does that tell you?”

“That there must be some powerful sorcery behind this and we would be better getting rid of him as soon as possible.”

“This is Robin of Locksley! If ever was a man capable of surviving a mortal wound like this one, that man is him.”

“What do suggest we do? Keep him here until he miraculously gets better?”

That, the young man soon realised, was out of the question. Because, even if Robin of Locksley was not dead right now, he was still severely injured and in dire need of medical attention. The best course of action would be sending for help. They quickly agreed that the best person -the _only_ person, really- who could deal with such a situation was King Richard himself, so the older man set out towards the camp in hopes of finding him before it was too late.

The young man carefully moved Robin deeper into the tent and placed him on his own bunk in an attempt to make him more comfortable until help arrived.

Getting to the King’s camp took the man a few hours, and it was even longer before he could locate and approach the King. Richard was not happy to see him, and as he stumbled over his words, trying to explain the impossible turn of events, he grew more and more confused.

“You’re saying he’s alive?”

“Well, he was when I left, but he wasn’t looking so good, so I don’t know. You should come, though. And bring help,” he added, knowing of the close relationship that his liege shared with the young nobleman. Surely he wouldn’t take offence that a mere subject was telling him what to do -not when it came to Robin’s wellbeing.

He was right. Richard was very skeptical that the man he had seen only last night looking decisively dead was anything _but_. However, after everything that Robin had gone through -and, more importantly, after what the King himself had put him through-, he would be damn if he didn’t do everything in his power to help him. If there was a chance for him, however incredibly small that chance might be, then King Richard would do _everything_ for him.

He owed it to him to at least check.

So he took the gravedigger’s advice, called upon his personal physician and the three of them rode back to the improvised cemetery.

They found Robin like he had been before –pale and unresponsive, but also warm and limp. Both gravediggers and the King waited outside the tent while the physician conducted his thorough examination. Finally, after an exasperatedly long while, the man emerged.

“I don’t know what happened,” he announced. “I’ve seen men dying from wounds half as bad as his, and yet, somehow, there he is.”

“He’s alive?” the king asked, his voice laced with wonder and relief.

“Barely. He must have lost consciousness due to all the blood he lost, that’s why you believed him to be dead. The cold temperatures at night must have kept his body protected and gave the wound a chance to start healing.”

“When will he awake?”

“Sadly, I can’t really tell you. I’m not even certain he _will_ awake –there’s no way of knowing how much damage was done and whether it can be reversed. He’s running a fever too, so we’ll have to wait until it breaks before we can know anything for sure. All I can say is that he shouldn’t have survived, and yet he did. Maybe that means something.”

“What can we do?” the King asked, recognizing that in this subject he didn’t have the least bit of authority. He would do exactly as the physician instructed him.

“There isn’t much to be done, at least not for now. I’m not comfortable with him moving, so he’s going to have to stay here for a while. I’ll come and check on him every day, but he’s going to need someone looking over him constantly, lest his condition change in any way.”

“We’ll do that,” the younger gravedigger agreed. There must be a powerful source behind Robin’s miraculous survival, and he would be better lending his hand to make sure that he _stayed_ alive.

“I’ll show you how to handle his bandages and what to do in the off case he wakes up,” the physician told him.

“I’ll see if I can contact his friends,” the King muttered pensively to himself. “They left my camp this morning and it was my understanding that they wanted to go back to England right away, but I will send someone immediately to Acre. One of them had relatives there; it’s possible they haven’t left yet.”

Finding the Outlaws was hard. The King’s men couldn’t just go to Acre and knock on every door just expecting one of them to answer. They didn’t have much to go on, either. Just a name: Djaq. As a result, it was about a week after Vaisey’s ambush that they finally found a man named Bassan who had been seen in contact with a few English men.

When the Knights finally found his house, he wasn’t overly enthusiastic to cooperate with them, but when he was informed that the King himself was eager to talk to anyone from Robin’s party he grudgingly agreed to pass the message to his niece and let her decide what she wanted to do.

Will and Djaq were shocked when they learned that the King had requested their presence at his camp, and more than a little reluctant to answer the call. It was Will, however, who reasoned that they couldn’t just ignore him, for there must be something very important behind such a call.

They rode into the desert and quickly arrived at the King’s camp. The sovereign had left strict instructions with his guards for them to be shown directly into his tent, so they didn’t have to wait long. However, the King refused to tell them anything there and instead instructed them to follow him.

They were both surprised to find themselves back in the small part of the desert that served as a cemetery and not the least bit excited about being there. The King told them to wait for him for a moment while he checked on something inside the tent. They just stood there in awkward silence, gazing at the few freshly-dug graves and trying not to think about their friend who was most certainly buried there.

Finally, after a painfully long while, the King emerged from the tent and proceeded to tell them the most extraordinary story about how Robin hadn’t really died and had instead spent the last week battling for his life in that little tent.

The words hanged in the air for a few moments before either of them could fully understand them. It was Djaq who did first, and when she addressed the King she was as angry as she was hurt.

“That is not possible,” she croaked. “Robin is dead. I checked him myself.”

“That is what we thought –what we _all_ thought. But I can assure you, he’s not. He’s very weak and in no means out of danger, but he’s a fighter and he’s been fighting for the last week to survive. You can check for yourselves if you like.”

Will barged past the sovereign into the tent, not the least concerned about propiety, closely followed by Djaq. And, surely enough, there was Robin. His skin was slightly less pale than it had been when they saw him last and they could clearly hear his laboured breaths now, but they were still reluctant to accept that he was really there.

“How is this even possible?” Will asked, mostly to himself.

Djaq just shook her head as her hands flew over her friend’s body, checking for a pulse. She let out a dry sob as she felt it and turned her shiny eyes to Will.

“It’s a miracle,” she said.

It was quickly agreed that the woman would stay, at the very least until Robin was strong enough to be moved. The physician continued to come every day and together with Djaq, they tended to Robin. Will set out immediately towards the shore, in hopes of catching up with Allan and Much before they set sail, but returned a few days later unsuccessful. He stayed at the tent with Djaq after that. (Another tent, bigger and with every luxury available in the desert had been set for the gravediggers as a ‘thank you’ for what they had done for Robin).

It was several days before anyone felt comfortable trying any sort of move, but the physician finally determined that Robin was as strong as he would be for at least a while, so they decided to go with Djaq’s plan and took him to Bassan’s, where she felt she could take a better care of him. The physician was a little weary at first, but King Richard decided that he had the utmost trust in the Saracen woman to care for Robin.

The road to recovery was long and steep. Many were the times when Will and Djaq would retire their own quarters thinking that their friend would not make it through the night. But Robin fought restlessly and finally, one morning when Will hesitantly pushed the door open, he found his former leader’s eyes opened and gazing hazily at him from the bed. The shock was such that the young man let out a string of oaths that would have made Allan proud if he were around.

However, as Djaq was later able to ascertain, the fact that the young man was awake hardly meant that he was healed. The first days were spent in a sort of limbo, as very little of what he was told appeared to take root inside his mind. But that too came to pass. He became stronger by the hour and sooner than anyone could have hoped for, he was back to his old self.

The first thing he wanted to know when the fog cleared was why Allan and (more importantly) Much were not by his deathbed. When he was told that the two men had already left for England, he was disappointed and when he realized that they had left for England _thinking that he was dead_ , he was downright alarmed.

“ _Dead?_ What do you mean that they think that I’m _dead_?,” he demanded.

“Your wound was very deep, Robin. We _all_ thought you were dead,” Djaq reasoned.

“But I’m _not_ ,” he insisted, still a bit groggily. His caregivers had decided not to tell him exactly how long he had been unconscious for if they could avoid it, so there were a few gaps in his memories that made it hard for him to understand what his friends were telling him. “I have to go and find Much.”

By the time Will understood what he meant, Robin had pushed the blankets off of him and was attempting to get out of bed himself.

“Robin, no, stop. You can’t go, you need to rest.”

“I _need_ to find Much and tell him I’m not dead,” he argued, struggling against Will’s hold. Well, ‘struggling’ might be a bit of a big word, because the truth was that the young man lacked the strength to put up any sort of fight. Will had no trouble pushing him back onto the bed, but knowing that Robin would not be deterred even by his physical limitations, Djaq decided to slip him a sleeping-draught to make sure that he rested.

The next few days went by in a similar fashion: Robin’s waking hours were spent inquiring about everything and everyone, and much as his friends tried to shelter him from the truth, he inevitably ended up trying to get out of bed every time he heard something he didn’t like. Djaq had to restock her supplies of herbs since she was using so much of them on the young man.

Progress was made much more slowly during those days, basically due to Robin’s inability to stay put during the hours when he was awake. It was only by reminding him that he needed to get better if he ever hoped to go back to England that they eventually managed to subdue him a little bit. But while his body remained in place, his mind was reeling. He thought about his friends and his peasants. He thought of Vaisey and Gisborne. He thought of poor, _poor_ Much, who had had to say goodbye to his best friend and of Allan -Allan, who must be wrecked by guilt since he was the reason why they had come to the Holy Land in the first place-, too. He thought of John –of the promise he had made to him and almost couldn’t live up to. And he thought of Marian. Repeatedly. He thought of her all alone in Sussex (hopefully), waiting for him... He had to go back. For all of them. They _needed_ him to go back.

In a few days he was finally able to stand, and in a few more he was taking small steps around the room.

“You must have someone that really loves you in Heaven,” Djaq commented as she watched him slowly taking a turn around the room. It really was a miracle that he was already up and about. Honestly, she would never cease to be amazed.

“Or hates me and doesn’t want to see me just yet,” he chuckled.

“Yeah, that too...”

He completed the turn and sat back on the bed, trying his best not to wince in pain. He had something he wanted to discuss with his friend and it would be best if she thought he was in better shape than he really was.

“Listen, Djaq. I’ve been thinking...”

“The answer’s no.”

“How do you even know what I was going to ask?”

“Because I know you. I know how you think. You’re going to ask me something outrageous.”

“I was not,” he said indignantly.

Djaq was not fooled. He may have been on his best behaviour these past few days, but the woman knew that he hadn’t given up on the idea of going back to their friends as soon as he could.

“Oh, then I suppose that your question had nothing to do with England, then?” she commented, her tone dripping with sarcasm.

He had the decency of looking slightly ashamed.

“Well, yes. But it’s not what you think.”

“It doesn’t matter, the answer is still no. You’re not strong enough to travel yet, Robin. You may think I can’t see you’re in pain, but trust me, it is obvious enough to anyone with eyes. And besides, your wound is only half healed. It can be infected if it’s not treated well.”

“I know! That’s why I wasn’t going to ask you to let me _go_.”

“What were you going to ask me, then?” she challenged.

“You’ll agree that it’s unfair that the lads back home think me dead when I’m obviously _not_ , right? I might not remember every little detail, but I’m pretty certain that Much was slightly unnerved by my untimely demise. I think that he deserves to be put out of his misery. Now, ideally, I would prefer to go and tell him myself, because you know how Much is -he’ll want to see proof with his very own eyes. But since I trust your judgment completely –even though you’re wrong, because I’m perfectly fine–, I’ll settle with sending them a few lines to put their minds at ease.”

He had a point, which made it all that much harder for Djaq to say no.

“Robin...”

“Oh, come on! If I can walk around the room, I certainly can pick up a quill!

“Yes, of course you can. But do you really think it’s wise? Or fair to them?”

“What do you mean _fair_? Of course it is! They will want to know –they deserve to know.”

Djaq came to sit next to him on the bed and took his hands in hers. Her expression was strangely subdued and she talked slowly, carefully, as one who is tiptoeing around a difficult subject.

“They do,” she agreed. “But not like this.”

“What do you mean?”

“Suppose you write to them. They are going to get the letter in a few weeks time. You will still be in no condition to travel then –that’s going to take a few months still. We’ll also need time to find a perfect ship for our journey, preferably one that carries a physician, or at the very least an ample stock of medical supplies so that I might treat you if any complications arise. All in all, it’s going to be some months between your letter getting to the lads and your even thinking about travelling. Do you really think it’s fair to them? Wouldn’t it be better if they knew when you were already on your way?”

Robin thought about it for a while. She _did_ have a point. Much would never agree to wait for months for his return –he’d be constantly on edge, and he really deserved better than that. Also, he might be tempted to come to him, and they’d probably end up missing each other completely.

He sighed and Djaq knew she had won _that_ argument.

“When then?” he asked her suddenly. “When can I write to them?”

She thought about it for a moment and gave him a milestone she deemed to be far enough in the future, but that would still seem somewhat obtainable to him.

“How about... when you can climb a flight of stairs without exhausting yourself. When you achieve that, we can start trying to find a ship and you can write home.”

“It’s a deal, then.”

They remained in comfortable silence for a while, each deep in their own thoughts.

“So...” he commented a few moments later, bringing Djaq back to reality. “ _Our_ journey, is it? You’re coming back too, then?” he asked with practised indifference, though there was a hopeful glint in his eyes.

She smiled slightly, because he suddenly looked like a child on his birthday, eagerly awaiting a present he wasn’t sure he was going to get. Djaq had made her decision several weeks ago, but even if she hadn’t, the look on his face at that moment would have been enough to sway her.

“I was beginning to think you hadn’t caught that. I’m going back. I’ve come to the conclusion that this isn’t my home anymore. I belong in Sherwood.”

“Are you sure?”

“As sure as I’ve ever been about anything.”

“Does Will know?”

“Not yet. I figured I would have my hands full with _you_ wanting to go back home; I thought perhaps it would be better if I waited a few days before telling Will.”

She was probably right. Will had been doing a remarkable job of looking as if this new lifestyle didn’t bother him, but both his friends could tell he missed his home. He would be delighted to know that Djaq did too.

Robin was sure that a flight of stairs wouldn’t be that much of an opponent to him. He was wrong. For one, it was several days before Djaq allowed him out of his room, let alone anywhere _near_ said stairs. And then, when he could finally try, he never made it past the first step. Also, she had made him promise before they even began that he would do as she instructed, so he wasn’t allowed out of the bed every day, as he would have liked.

When the King came back to visit him (he had sent a messenger every week, but some important business had made it impossible for him to visit his young friend personally until that moment, he said) Robin was still nowhere near the goal that had been set for him.

Richard was overjoyed to see him up and about and thanked Bassam very warmly for his hospitality. He joked good-naturedly with his young commander and teasingly ordered him not to put them through any of that ever again. It seemed like an innocent enough visit –a reunion of two long-lost friends. That, however, wasn’t entirely the case, as they would soon learn when the King’s true motives became clear a few minutes later.

“I have a confession to make,” he told Robin as the two sat together in the living room at Bassan’s –Djaq had had to agree to let him out of his room, though he had overworked himself the day before and she would have rather he rested for a while longer. “I have another motive to rejoice at your wellbeing.”

“Oh. And what may that be?” the young man asked curiously.

“War has ended,” he announced without preamble, much to Robin’s delight. “Saladin and I have reached an agreement. We’ll be going home soon.”

“Well, that is great news!”

“It is, indeed.” He paused for a moment. “Listen, Robin, there’s something I wanted to ask you. We are going back to England soon and you more than anyone must realise that the country we have left is not the one we are coming back to. Our enemies are hiding among our friends, waiting for the right time to make their move. I need your help. You alone can end the war back at home.”

It was the right thing to say. If Robin had felt any sort of qualms about following King Richard on this latest quest, having his vanity appealed to would have certainly changed his mind. But it was unnecessary in this case because Robin didn’t need the incentive. He had already agreed to go with him even before he was invited.

“When do we leave?”  he asked.

“Not for a while, I’m afraid. There are a few things that need to be sorted out: we need to regroup our troops, find a ship that will take us and so on. We have to proceed with caution, so it would be best if we came up with a plan even before we left Acre. All those things take time. Besides,” he added, casting a glance in Djaq’s direction –she hadn’t said a word yet, but clearly, she wasn’t pleased with either of them. “–I want you to have all of your strength back before we go. It would really be a shame if Djaq went through all of the trouble of saving your life only to have you die at sea. I can’t believe she would be too happy with me if that were the case.”

“I’m fine,” Robin replied automatically. He was too busy thinking about what he would do once he was back in England to worry about something as insignificant as his physical wellbeing.

“Robin, do you remember our agreement?” the Saracen pressed.

He shot her a quick smile over his shoulder.

“I will keep my promise, Djaq.”

And he did. As soon as the King left half an hour later, Robin marched towards the stairs, determined to prove to all of them that he really was fine. Will went after him to make sure he didn’t hurt himself, but he couldn’t do more than watch him and catch him every time he stumbled over his own feet.

“That’s enough for today, maybe you should rest-,” he tried to reason several hours later.

“I’ll rest when I’m dead.”

“If you don’t rest, you’ll _be_ dead soon!”

“Quit it, Will. I’ve got this.”

For the next few days, Robin spent every waking hour in Bassan’s living room, trying to drag his uncooperative body up the stairs. He would only pause to eat, and that was only because Will made him and he took the food directly to him. Djaq was starting to get worried about him, fearing that he was doing himself more harm than good.

“You should talk to the King when he comes tomorrow. I’m sure he will wait for Robin if you tell him he’s not ready yet,” Will reasoned when she shared her fears with him, two weeks later. Richard had sent someone to inform them that he was ready to leave when they were and had promised to come by the house the next day to work out the details. “He’s fairly reasonable, and he loves Robin. He won’t want to put him in danger.”

“It’s Robin who I’m worried about. The King has already put off his trip for Robin’s sake (I don’t buy for a second that he needed two weeks to sort things out) and I’m sure he’d do it again if I told him we need more time. But Robin is not going to stop pushing himself and I’m afraid he’s going to get hurt.”

Will was about to point out that their friend was well aware of his limits and he wouldn’t push himself to the breaking point –it would take him that much longer to get better if he did– when they heard a cry coming from the living room’s general direction. Exchanging a worried look, they ran out of the room, only to find the parlour completely deserted.

“Well then...” Robin’s familiar voice commented lightly as they turned their heads. He was on the first floor, leaning casually against the bannister. He looked pale and tired, but his eyes shone with triumph. “It would seem as if we’re going back home, don’t you think?”

Anxious as they were, Will and Dajq couldn’t help but smile at him.

When Richard came the next day, he was genuinely surprised to see Robin looking almost like his old self. His movements were still slow, but there was a certain cheerfulness that had been absent for many months.

“Ready to go, then?” he asked his young friend.

“Yes. All I have to do is put the finishing touches on the letter to the lads and then I’ll be all yours,” he commented cheerfully.

“Yes, about that... Listen, Robin... You already know that our mission must remain absolutely secret. We can’t risk our enemies knowing we’re coming, or else they’ll be ready for us.”

“I know. That’s why I won’t tell them you’re coming –though, for the record, I trust they’d keep the secret if they needed to.”

“I trust them too,” the  King assured him. He had learned from his previous mistakes and would never again question the outlaws’ loyalties. “I’m just worried that your letter may fall in the wrong hands and our whole plan will be compromised.”

It was a very sensible concern, but that didn’t make it any more bearable to Robin.

“Cheer up, mate. This way you will get to see their faces when they learn the truth” Will reminded him. This made things marginally better, but Robin would still have rather announced his survival beforehand. He hated to think that people had been suffering on his behalf when he had been relatively well all this time.

Preparations were made and soon the day of their journey came.

Robin watched from the deck of the ship as everybody ran around getting everything ready –Djaq had told him before they left Bassan’s that if he expected to her to clear him for duty when they docked, he would have to do exactly as she told him, including staying out of the way for the duration of their voyage–, one thought and one thought only in his mind.

“I’m coming home, lads.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://writerladymarianne.blogspot.com/


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is the summer break over yet? If there's one thing Harry Potter has taught me is that September 1st is the day kids go back to school in the UK, so I'm going to assume that the holidays are over all across the Northern Emisphere. Also, if I don't post this soon, I'm going to keep working on it and I'm going to keep adding more and more stuff and -trust me- Robin can't handle anything else in this chapter. 
> 
> I really thought that there was no way that this story could get any more angsty, but *boy* was I wrong! Honestly, I feel like I ought to apologize because what I'm doing to Robin is borderline criminal. I swear, it might not look like it, but I really do like him and I take no pleasure in the psychological torture I'm putting him through. 
> 
> I blame real life. 
> 
> This is the last "real" chapter. All that's left is a very short epilogue to tie everything together. It's sad, but at the same time, I'm excited to move on to a new project.

**CHAPTER X.**

It would have been impossible to hear the agony that Robin had gone through and not feel a thing, so it was understandable that his friends had a lot to ponder once they had heard the whole tale. Fortunately for the outlaws, they had plenty of time to do just that because -just as Djaq had predicted- Robin slept for many hours.

Once the story was done, they returned to their previous spots. Djaq and Will, who had had very little rest during the past few weeks, sat on the stone steps of the castle and simply basked in the glory of being back home. Luke and Kate joined them for a while, filling them in on everything they had missed while they were away, before embarking on a quest to find something to eat.

Allan also stayed in the courtyard for a while, long enough to decide that he wasn’t really all that mad that Robin was alive. He was _a little_ mad, obviously, and he would be sure to mention it to his friend when he awoke, but considering everything that the other man had gone through since that dreadful day, Allan decided he could cut him some slack. Life had obviously not been easy for him, and it wasn’t as if he had consciously decided to fake his death just to mess with them. Allan could forgive him for that, especially now that the whole thing was over and he was back where he belonged. Once he reached this conclusion -about two minutes later-, he decided to make himself useful and went to see if the King had anything for him to do. John, who had never required to think things through in the first place because he had known at once that whatever had happened it had not been Robin's fault and he couldn't be held responsible for it, went with him.

Marian was itching to go to Robin’s side -she had been, from the second Will had stopped talking-, but Djaq had put an end to any attempts she might have made early on, stating that in no way was the young man strong enough to entertain any sort of visitors, particularly those who would most certainly end up exciting him. He needed to rest, she had said. Only once he was awake and Djaq had had the chance to examine him again would the Saracen consider the possibility of allowing a few of their friends into his room.

“Robin promised he'd do as I say, and if you really want him to get better as soon as he can, you'll do too,” she had said.

Marian resented the accusation, because if there was one person in Nottingham that ardently wished for Robin to get better that person was his betrothed, and she told Djaq as much. But the other woman was right, as she usually was about these matters. As much as she wanted to promise that she would simply sit still by Robin's side and patiently wait while his body got its much-needed rest, the truth was that she could do no such thing. She _needed_ to talk to him; she had to make sure that it was really him and that he was really alive and relatively well. Being away from him for a few more hours would be torture, but it was the only thing she could do to make sure that she wouldn't make things any harder than they needed to be.

And so it was with great reluctance that she agreed to do as she was asked, but her displeasure was obvious enough to anyone who happened to be near her. She tried to keep busy, first by  joining Will, Djaq, Luke and Kate in their conversation, then by pacing the courtyard and finally by practising her aim with her bow, but no activity held her attention for more than a few minutes, after which she would simply turn on her heels and find something else to do. Her behaviour started to get on her friends’ nerves _very_ quickly, though they were all too kind to say anything about it.

Much, in particular, felt as if he would certainly go mad if she didn't stop her antics soon. He had a lot on his plate already and he was barely keeping himself together. Watching Marian coming undone and doing such a poor job concealing it was an added stress he could really do without.

It eventually got to the point when he could take it no more: he would either remind Marian that she wasn't the only one who loved Robin and could she _please_ consider what others might be going through, _or_ he would have to find a way to step away himself. Being someone who rather preferred to avoid confrontation if he could manage it, Much chose the latter option.

“Where are you going?” Marian demanded when she caught a slight movement from his side of the courtyard and saw that he was gathering his things to leave.

Except for Much and her, all outlaws had left the courtyard at different points in the last few hours, but never for too long and always with a good reason. They had even refused an offer by the King that they stayed in the castle as his guests, which would have allowed them to take possession of some rooms where they might have rested for a while. They had not, all of them silently agreeing that the courtyard was the place to be if they wanted to be sure that they would hear any and all news pertaining their friend's health as soon as there might be anything to communicate.

(The fact that Djaq -who would be the one in charge to pass said news given that she was the only one who was allowed to visit Robin's chamber- could have easily found any of them in any room they might have been sleeping in was not something any of them had thought of, nor had the Saracen woman cared to point out).

That any of the outlaws had decided that they had had enough with waiting was surprising, but that it was _Much_ who bolted first was downright shocking.

“There’s something I need to do,” he replied mysteriously.

He walked along the familiar streets of Nottingham first and then along the even more familiar roads of Sherwood for a while, his head becoming clearer the further away he got from Marian. Around her, he couldn't focus on his own pain, which had been a blessing during the past few months, but certainly was not so now.

Robin had always tried to get Much to hold on and get comfort from the good bit of any particular scheme that might have gone wrong. _There's always a good bit_ , he would tell him, however disastrously everything else might have gone. Much had always found it easier to focus on the bad things, as they were what would often dictate the course of their lives.

In this particular case, the “bad things” were blatantly obvious:  Robin had gone through hell and back. He had laid, close to death, away from everyone and everything he had ever cared about for a week and had then spent many more dangling on the edge, barely holding on. No way could Much ignore that. No one who cared about Robin even a little bit would.

But, for the first time in his life, the young servant actually understood the point his master had been trying to make all those times when he had told him to quit being so pessimist: terrible as everything else might seem, the “good bit” shone brightly through the darkness, like a beam of sunlight after a vicious storm.

Robin was back. And yes, he very nearly wasn’t, and yes, Much had been lied to for weeks and yes, there were parts of his heart that were still missing. But he _was_ back. That was the bottom line.

Everyone who had been hurt by Robin’s passing would have to deal with his return in their own way, and Much was suddenly very glad that he had taken the chance to ponder everything alone for a while. As much as it pained him to admit it, in this instance, there was nothing he could do for Marian’s (or anyone else’s, for that matter) sake -nor them for his.

Also, there was something that needed to be done that no one else had thought of doing.

He returned an hour or so later, carrying a small pile of fabric that he passed mutely to Djaq.

“His are filthy,” he offered as means of explanation as the woman unfolded one of Robin’s favourite hoodies, a small smile playing at her lips. “Besides, I think he would be more comfortable with these.” Dressed as a trader as he had been, Robin hadn't looked like himself –and Much desperately wanted him to look like himself. Much wanted him to be back.

“I’ll be right back,” Djaq said, getting to her feet.

“Wait!” the servant called out before she had taken a step. “Take this too,” he added, unbuckling his belt and laying his sword -Robin’s sword, which he had retrieved from Gisborne's body before it had been taken away- on top of the clothes.

“He’s not going to need it, Much,” Will reminded him.

“I don’t care. Under no circumstances should he be unarmed ever again.”

Djaq smiled slightly and went to check on her patient.

The rest of the day was spent much in the same fashion and when night finally took over and their exhaustion became too obvious to be ignored, the outlaws succumbed to it in their spots.

By the time that Robin finally began to stir it was just after dawn and his friends had been asleep for a few hours.

He laid on his bed for a while as his body and his mind fought against the last of Djaq’s draught. When he was finally free and fully awake, he got carefully out of bed -mindful of every little move he made- and surveyed his body. There were some new bruises forming as well as a few cuts, but all in all, he wasn't as bad as he had anticipated. He had certainly been much worse not that long ago. Even his arm didn’t hurt as much as it could.

His fingers instinctively found his old scar –the source of so much pain for the past months– and he was surprised when he found that most of his torso was wrapped in tight bandages. He smiled as he realised that Djaq had taken advantage of the ample stock of medical supplies available in Nottingham, making up for all the times she had had to make do with very little. He was even more surprised as he took a hesitant step forward and found that the wound didn’t bother him at all. (That was certainly a first: though it was healed now and didn’t hurt him like it had at the beginning, the scar had still throbbed occasionally, causing Robin a nearly permanent discomfort).

Someone -Djaq, most likely- had left a jar and a basin for him to wash with on a nearby table, so he slowly made his way across the room towards it.

He removed his shirt, took a damp cloth and careful not to soak his bandages, he washed the blood that was not just his own but probably Gisborne’s from his body. Once he was sure he had gotten all of it, he glanced back at the shirt he had carelessly tossed on the floor and winced. No use in getting the blood of his body if he would still have to wear bloody clothes, he reflected angrily. He would cause quite the stir walking around with a big red stain on the front of his shirt, but maybe the fact that Robin would be on his own two feet might be enough to convince people that he wasn't bleeding to death, much as his clothes might suggest otherwise.

Unlikely, yes, but it was the only arrow left in his quiver.

He was still trying to find a way around his predicament when his eyes caught sight of a small bundle lying atop the bed. He knew at once what it was, but he approached it carefully, absolutely terrified to be proven wrong.

“ _Much_ ,” he breathed longingly, moved almost to tears by the small gesture. To some -to most, really-, it would mean nothing. A spare shirt to replace the one he had been wearing. But to Robin -to Robin, it was so much more than that.

He had been dead for months. He had come back without telling anyone. He had announced himself before the better part of Nottingham and had barely spared a glance in his friends’ direction. _And yet_ here Much was, taking care of him, just as he had been doing for half their lives.

Robin had no idea of what awaited him on the other side of the door. He had been out for several hours, which meant that people would have had plenty of time to decide what they thought of him without his say on the matter. One thing was certain, though: Much, at least, expected him -the real _him_ , the man he had been before that terrible day in Acre so many months ago- to make an appearance. And -by God-, he would.

Even if on the inside he was more scared than he had ever been. Even if a part of him felt like hiding out in this very room forever. Even if he didn’t feel even an ounce of the confidence that usually coursed through his veins. If _Much_ expected the same old confident Robin to waltz along the corridors of Nottingham castle, then he _would be_ the same old confident Robin.

He would do _anything_ that Much asked him to do.

Other than Marian, his former servant had been on Robin’s mind the most. He had thought that nothing could have affected him more than Marian’s look when he went to inform her that he had decided to follow King Richard to the Holy Land all those years ago, but he had been dead wrong. Much’s tortured expression as Robin tried to say his goodbyes had haunted most of his dreams and quite a number of his waking hours. He had heard him calling his name, pleading with him not to go, not to leave him -he had felt his hands gripping his body tightly, clutching him to his body as if that way he could somehow prevent his soul from floating away.

Hurting Much was not something the young Lord had ever set out to do on purpose, and yet it was something that had happened several times over the years. There had been times when Robin had been a terrible master and an even worse friend, taking out his frustrations on the only person who was stupid enough to remain by his side. Anyone else would have given up on him much, much sooner, but not Much. Much had always remained, always faithful, always loyal... He really was a better friend than Robin deserved.  

Hiding out in the battlements the day before, Robin had decided that the first thing he would do after everything was over would be talking to Marian, but thinking it over for half a second he decided that he owed it to Much to see him first. After all, it had been Much who had held his hand as he took his last breaths. It had been Much who had saved both his life and Marian’s by providing him with a sword to protect himself against Gisborne. He owed _everything_ to Much, and after such a clear sign that the young man was desperate to see him, _the least_ that Robin could do for him was put his mind at ease.

He was certain that Marian would understand and wouldn’t hold _that_ against him.

Getting ready took slightly more time than he had expected, mostly because every movement he made was measured and contrived. But he managed to put on the new shirt, fasten his sword around his waist and he instantly felt better than he had felt in a long, _long_ while. With his trademark hoodie and his trusted weapon, he could finally say that Robin Hood was really back. All he needed now was his bow...

Djaq had dispatched the two guards that were supposed to keep watch over his room, knowing full well that he _would_ slip past them if he really wanted to. No use in making things harder for him, she had reasoned. The hallway was also deserted as he made his way slowly to the courtyard.  Everyone seemed to be too busy or too tired to care about him, which was actually pretty good news. He was fairly certain he was not supposed to be wandering about the castle in his condition but he simply couldn’t bring himself to care.

Judging by the time of the day, it was safe to assume that everybody would be down the great hall having breakfast. This could be a problem, Robin thought, because though he was certain he would find Much there, he was really hoping they could have a few words alone before he had to report back to the King. Bursting into a crowded room would not play well with his plan, but he couldn’t really see a way around it. All he could do was hope the King didn’t take offence when he favoured his former manservant before him. (And if he did, so be it; he wasn’t about to change his mind anyway).

As it turned out, Robin needn’t have worried about getting to his friends before the King got to him, because as he turned a corner he ended up literally crashing into the very man he was thinking of.

Much had awoken after an hour of restless sleep. All of his friends had been unconscious, even Marian, who had eventually collapsed in a corner absolutely drained of energy. At first, Much hadn’t planned to go and check on Robin, but when it had become clear that Djaq had no intention whatsoever to visit his room any time soon, the servant had become worried that maybe his master might be awake and in need of assistance, and so he had decided to go and take a quick look. Just in case. Old habits die hard, he had thought to himself.

Djaq didn’t know this, but she had been followed on one of her frequent visits to Robin’s chamber. He hadn’t done it on purpose, really -he hadn’t been waiting in the shadows until she passed. But it had just so been that he had happened to be coming out of the kitchen and had seen her walking by. He had known at once where she was going and a deep-seated instinct had urged him to follow her. He had had no intention of breaking his promise -he had just needed to know where he was. It was his job, after all -had been so for over half his life.

Sneaking away from the sleeping outlaws had been easy, as had been making his way along the nearly deserted corridors. With Vaisey in the dungeons and the true King of England in charge of the shire, there was little need to keep guard. Much hadn’t been paying attention his surroundings, as he had been too busy trying to remember whether Djaq had turned right or left at the end of a corridor. He had finally decided that he was pretty sure that Djaq had turned right, so that was what he had done when he reached to corner.

He had never expected Robin to be up already, and much less that he would be out and about -maybe he should have, because this was _Robin_ , and when did Robin _ever_ take things easy?- but for whatever reason, he did not see it coming.

They reached the corner at the same time and each was so focused on their own thoughts that neither had time to react. And so it was that they ended up crashing against each other, the force of the impact being such that all the wind was knocked out of the young lord’s lungs. Much, in turn, bounced against Robin’s chest, lost his balance and fell on his bum to the ground, where he remained for a few moments, too dazed to understand what had just happened.

Time seemed to move more slowly as the two men locked eyes with one another and tried to get their thoughts in some semblance of order. It was almost funny how utterly unprepared each of them was for this conversation, especially considering that they had both been seeking the other out.

“I expect you have a few questions,” Robin finally commented, his voice casual but with a definite strain to it.

“Only a hundred or so,” Much agreed from his position on the floor. He was certain that his knees would be wobbly if he tried to stand, so he decided that he wouldn’t risk it.

The younger man smiled slightly.

“I will answer everything you want me to, Much,” he promised. “But can I just -I have to tell you something first.”

Much arched an eyebrow, because it wasn’t like Robin to stumble over his words -nor was it like him to suddenly look so unsure of himself.

“I’m -I’m _sorry_ , Much. More than you could possibly know.”

For all his careful pondering, Much had not once thought of laying any sort of blame on Robin. He had blamed Will and Djaq. He had blamed King Richard. He had _obviously_ blamed Vaisey and Gisborne and he had blamed himself for being persuaded by others. But he had not blamed Robin. How could he have, after everything he had gone through?

“Master-” he began even though he had no idea of what he could possibly say to put his mind at ease. He soon realized, however, that he needn’t really say anything, as Robin was not listening to him.

“I had very little say in what happened to me these past several months, but even so, I should have put my foot down and I  should have told you what was happening,” the young man was saying, completely oblivious to his servants own words. “But believe me when I tell you that the very idea that you didn’t know that I was alive absolutely broke me, Much, it really did. You -you are- and I-”

Robin closed his eyes, annoyed at himself for being unable to put into words what was so clearly obvious in his mind. A part of him wanted to give up and let Much read between the lines for his true feelings, but another, much greater part, reminded him that it was imperative that he opened his heart up to his friend at least once in his life.

Taking a deep breath, he continued.

“I know I’ve said and done some admittedly really terrible things to you over the years -mostly unintentionally, but sometimes, I admit, quite willingly- and you’ve always forgiven me. I’d understand if this was something you _couldn’t_ forgive, but I really hope that someday you’ll find it in your heart the strength to do so. You’re my best friend, Much, and I swear to you that I will spend the rest of my life trying to make it up to you -if you’ll let me.”

Much didn’t reply for the longest time -so much time, in fact, that Robin began to get worried, because his friend had never been one to stay quiet for long. But he didn’t push him for an answer, though, and instead he let him work through his thoughts at his own pace. The servant was grateful for the chance. His thoughts were in a jumble and he needed a few moments to process everything that Robin had just told him.

When he finally spoke, his words came out clear and certain, in a tone not too different from Robin’s usual tone. In some dark recess of his mind, the servant realized that somehow their roles appeared to have been reversed: Robin was the fidgety one while Much was the one who was trying to keep a clear head and be reassuring. It would have been funny if it hadn’t been so heartbreaking.

“You were dead,” he said at last. He was merely stating a fact, but he saw Robin flinch as if he had been whipped and his heart broke a little more.

“I understand, but-”

“No, Robin, you _don’t_. You were _dead_. I held you in my arms as you bled out. I watched you take your last breaths and I thought -I thought that that was it. That I was never going to see you again. I’ve woken up every morning thinking that every day there was a little less of you left in that grave and every night I’ve prayed that you might have found peace wherever you were and that you might forgive me -for failing to look after you; for not being there for you when you needed me.”

“ _Much-_ ”

“But you’re _not_ dead,” Much continued after a pause, and there was such awe in his voice that Robin allowed himself to feel hopeful for the first time. “You are not dead. You came back to us and I- I’m so happy that- I’m so happy that I might _burst into a song!_ ”

And, just like that, everything was alright again. Robin’s relief was so strong that it burst out of him in the form of a sound that was neither a snort nor a laugh, but a combination of the two. He was no longer the scared little boy he had been only a second ago -he was the same old Robin who went about life as if nothing could touch him because he truly believed that with Much by his side, nothing could. The world had shifted and returned to its normal axis. _Finally_.

“You know what, Much? I’m so happy that I might join you.”

“Really? Did you hit your head when you died?”

Robin chuckled with real glee and the sight of him was so familiar that Much laughed too, his own relief slowly taking over every doubt and heartache he had felt over the past year.

Realizing quite suddenly that he was still on the floor, Much struggled to get on his feet. Noticing this, Robin stepped forward, offered him his hand and pulled him directly into his waiting arms. As if that hadn’t been surprising enough, the young Lord then did something he had done perhaps once or twice in all the time that Much had known him: he wrapped his arms tightly around his shoulders and hugged him like a brother.

To say that the older man was surprised by this sudden display of affection would be an understatement and for a moment he could do nothing but stand there, his arms pinned to his side and his mind completely blank. He was eventually able to return the embrace and they stood like that for a while.

“Can you promise me something?” Much asked later, stepping away from his friend and wiping the tears that had began to fall a while ago from his eyes.

“Anything,” Robin vowed, his eyes also red-rimmed.

“Don’t do that again, will you? I mean _die_. Twice now I’ve had to see that and I don’t think I could go through that again.”

Though it was said mostly in jest, Robin recognized the true pain behind Much’s words and he replied he was as solemn as he had ever been.

“I wouldn’t dream of hurting you again, Much. I promise.”

“Good. That’s good to hear. So… What do you say if we go get some breakfast? You _must_ be starving. When was the last time you ate? You look absolutely _flimsy_. I bet you were so caught up with your plan that you’ve been skipping meals again, haven’t you?”

Robin laughed good-naturedly this time but he also looked slightly ashamed.

“I might have,” he admitted.

Much linked his arm around his and starting guiding him towards the great hall, as if he didn’t expect him to make it on his own. He must have looked worse than he felt, Robin thought.

“I’m surprised that Djaq let you get away with it. She really should have known better than to expect you’d look after yourself when you had other things to worry about,” he commented.

“You really shouldn’t be too hard on Djaq -or Will, for that matter. They really did the best that they could under the circumstances.”

“Yeah, I know you’re right. It’s just that I can’t help thinking of what would have happened if I hadn’t let them convince me to leave you there! I would have been there for you and-”

“And what, Much? You wouldn’t have been able to help me and you would have had to watch me dying all over again. No, as much as it has pained me that the truth was kept from you, I’m actually glad that you weren’t there to see me at my worst.”

Much disagreed but he knew that he wouldn’t be able to change Robin’s mind even if he tried. He decided to save his breath instead, though in his heart he knew that he _should_ have been with Robin -even if it had meant to have his heart even more broken than he already did.

“Can I ask you something?” Robin said suddenly. Much looked at him, but he didn’t look back. In fact, he was studiously avoiding looking at him. It took the servant two heartbeats to realize what his master wanted to talk about.

“Marian’s fine,” he assured him.

“Marian is _here_ ,” Robin countered, pleased that he had been saved the embarrassment of actually having to ask. “She wasn’t supposed to be.”

“Be honest, Robin. Did you _really_ believe that she would agree to go to Sussex without putting up some sort of fight?”

“Of course I didn’t! I just thought that John would have known better than to allow himself to be persuaded.”

“Apparently she made some really good points. Besides, whether you like it or not, you have to admit that this is where she belongs. Marian has been fighting for the same things that Robin Hood stands for even before you became Robin Hood,” Much reminded him.

He was right, of course. Robin knew this, but the shock of seeing the woman he loved so close to danger was still fresh in his mind.

“How has she been doing?” he asked.

Much shrugged.

“It’s been - _hard_. For everyone, but more so for her, given her history with Gisborne. I think she’s been feeling guilty that she didn’t allow you to kill him when you had the chance.”

“She’s going to be _so mad_ -”

“Yes, she will.”

“Jesus, Much, cut me some slack, will you? You could try to be a bit kinder to me.”

“There’s no point in lying -you know as well as I do that Marian is going to be furious at you. That being said, I don’t think it will really amount to anything. She has really been in hell these past few months, so I don’t think that she will willingly put herself through that again.”

“I really hope you’re right, Much, because I do want to keep my promise to you.”

They were laughing when they got to the gallery, but the smile soon left Robin’s face when he caught sight of the scene before him.

The courtyard was almost completely deserted. The outlaws apparently had awoken and gone to get breakfast, probably guessing that Much would be looking after Robin. Only one of them remained. A lone figure laying curled up against one of the columns.

Robin took the opportunity to look at her and note all the changes that had occurred since he had seen her last. She looked even smaller than he remembered her as if she had lost some weight that she really shouldn’t have. Her skin looked too pale to be considered healthy, and even when she was sleeping he could tell that she was exhausted. She bore very little a resemblance to the strong woman he was so used to, and for that Robin blamed only himself.

He really was glad that neither Much nor Marian had had to watch him fighting for his life, but looking at Marian -seeing her obvious distress-, he wished they could have found some sort of compromise that would have put her mind at ease. She had really suffered, and if there was one thing that Robin could not stand was to see those he loved in any sort of pain. Especially when he was the one who had inflicted it.

“I’ll leave you two to talk,” Much said. “I’ll tell the lads that you’ll talk to them soon, but don’t take too long.”

“Thanks, Much.”

“Don’t mention it.”

The servant patted him on the back reassuringly as he passed. Robin waited until the door had closed behind him to move. He walked slowly towards her, careful not to startle her. He sat across from her and gently grabbed one of her hands in both of his.

“Time to wake up, love,” he whispered gently, brushing his lips against the back of her hand. “We have much to talk about.”

Very slowly, Marian began to stir.

* * *

The sun was shining brightly in her eyes, but that was not what awoke her. It was the gentle rubbing of a familiar calloused hand against her own that did it, the soft whisper of a very recognizable voice in her ear that slowly guided her towards consciousness.

She didn’t open her eyes at first, instead choosing to indulge every other of her senses. He felt the same. His gentle caress still arose the same tingle on her skin that it had always arose -even when she was so mad at him that she could have killed him herself-, as did his silky voice murmuring something she couldn’t quite catch in her drowsie state.  He smelled clean, but with a distant hint of wood and grass that she never failed to associate with him and only him. He must be leaning over her, because she could feel him all around her, wrapped around her body like a blanket or, better yet, a body armour that was supposed to shield her from any danger.

She was suddenly overwhelmed by the need to indulge another of her senses, but she resisted as well as she could. She would _not_ kiss him. Not yet. Not until they had cleared a few things.

“Sussex?” she asked casually, her eyes still closed.

There was a very brief pause and then she heard him chuckle -a sound that warmed her to her very core, because despite everything else that she might be feeling, she did love it. Even if there was very little to laugh about in this particular situation.

“Why not? I hear it’s a lovely place.”

“So is Nottingham,” she countered.

“True, but Sussex doesn’t have an evil Sheriff plotting against the King.”

“I suppose that one should probably be able to make a nice peaceful life for oneself in Sussex,” she granted. “Then again, where would be the fun in that?”

He chuckled again when he heard his own words casually thrown back at him. It was a huge relief to be able to fall back into their usual patterns with Marian. He was glad that this was how she had chosen to start their conversation, though in his heart he knew that she deserved more from him.

“Where, indeed,” he agreed. “I was just trying to keep you safe. And, before you say anything, _yes_ , I know that you can take care of yourself. You’re one of the most accomplished fighters I know and I have no doubt that you don’t need me to keep an eye on you, but I panicked. God only knows what Vaisey had planned for you and I decided that I really didn’t care to find out. Hence the whole Sussex thing.”

Marian was glad that her eyes were still closed, because they were suddenly filled with tears. Robin was being more open and honest than she had ever seen him, which hinted at an ever deeper heartache than she had even dared to imagine. And he wasn’t done, apparently.

Though he wasn’t a big fan of opening himself up, Robin knew that there could be no secrets between them. If he really wanted to put the last year behind him, he would have to bare his soul to her so they might begin to heal. It would be difficult, but it was the right thing to do. Hopefully after today they would never have to talk about it again.

“For what it’s worth, the mere thought of leaving you behind made me sick. It took more strength than I knew I had, I promise.”

“You _had_ to go, Robin. The King needed you,” she assured him.

“Did he really? Somebody else could have warned him - _or_ he could have been more mindful of who he trusted. He’s a big boy, he shouldn’t need a babysitter. I should have stayed here with you. I should have married you when I had the chance and we should have looked after the people of Locksley together. _That_ is what I should have done.”

A few months ago, Marian would have jumped at the opportunity of telling Robin that he had been wrong and she had been right. But just as Robin had been changed by the events of the last few months, so had Marian.

The first time he had left she had been very young -barely more than a girl, really. She had claimed to know him and to understand him, but the truth was that she had not. She had lacked the knowledge of the ways of life to make such a claim. But she was older now. And wiser. She had a much better understanding of many things, including of Robin’s character: she knew that there was more to him than a boy who had escaped his responsibilities at home by joining a war that no one had asked him to join. He was a tortured soul, always putting the “greater good” above his own happiness –that’s why he had joined the King’s Private Guard, that’s why he had saved Allan and Will and Luke when they were to be hanged, getting himself outlawed, that’s why he had left again without saying goodbye, and why he had come back behind everyone’s back. He had always tried to do the right thing, even when things ended up not working for the best for him.

Marian hadn’t seen that at first, stubborn as she had been. But she did now.

She opened her eyes slowly and locked her gaze with his. He looked older than he really was -exhausted as if he had been carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. She wondered why she was only just seeing this, as this transformation had obviously been happening for a long time. The man who had showed up at her doorstep five years after breaking their engagement had not been the same man who had left. He had tried to look the part, but looking back on it now, it was obvious enough.

She entwined her fingers with his and gave his hand a gentle squeeze.

“I’m not mad that you left,” she said slowly. “Both times. Well, I’m still a little mad that you left the first time, but on the second time you did what you thought you must do. You protected the King so that your people could have a better England. I understand that. And I- I’m proud of you, Robin. Why are you shaking your head?”

“I didn’t do it for the people of Nottingham,” he explained. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m beyond pleased that things will probably get better now that Richard is back and Vaisey is no longer in charge, but I can’t claim that I was thinking of them when I made the decision to leave for the Holy Land.”

“Why did you do it then?”

“You really don’t see it? Everything I did was for _you_ . You deserve better than living prisoner in a castle, with Gisborne breathing down your neck... You shouldn’t have to risk your life to prevent your people from going hungry. I went to the Holy Land to stop Vaisey from killing the King because I wanted _you_ to have a better England. I brought him back _for you_ and you alone _._ Surely, you must know that...”

For the first time in her life she could honestly say that she did. She really did. He would do anything for those he loved.

“ _We find Lardner, we bring the King home and then we get married_ ,” she chanted, mostly to herself. She had been worried that day, she recalled, because she didn’t have anyone to give her away on their wedding. Robin had promised her that the King would do it, and that was when he had vowed to bring him back. _Why_ hadn’t she realized this before? She should have married Robin then -Much could have given her away. Or Allan. Or she could have given herself away. It wouldn’t have mattered, so long as she had ended up married to the love of her life. But she hadn’t, and she had almost lost Robin.

“Exactly.”

“Brilliant plan, really,” she added tensely. The idea that Robin had gone to the Holy Land to fulfill a silly whim of hers was more than she could bear and she desperately needed to rid her mind of such a terrible notion. “Or it _would have been_ if you hadn’t gotten yourself _killed_ in the process! As if it would have done any good for the King to come back if you hadn’t been here to reclaim your place as...”

And that’s about everything she got to say. Knowing better than to fooled by her apparent anger, Robin had suddenly closed the space between them and had his arms firmly wrapped around her small frame, pinning her against the stone wall upon which she had been laying.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered in her ear, his lips brushing against the soft skin of her neck and his hot breath wreaking havoc in her thoughts.

She threw her arms around his neck and pulled him closer to her. He had lost a lot of weight, but he was still significantly heavier than her. Not wanting to crash her, Robin shifted so that he was half sitting against one of the pillars and Marian was straddling him.

“Oh, Robin, I’m so happy!” she sobbed into his chest.

“I know,” he replied. “I’m happy too.”

They sat in that embrace for a while, her tears soaking the front of his shirt while his mingled with her dark curls. When he felt she was slightly calmer he placed his hands on her shoulders and held her at arm’s length.

“I love you, Marian,” he said. This wasn’t the first time he had said the words, but it was one of the few times he did so without being probed. He was a firm believer that actions should speak louder than words, so he often favoured the former over the latter. Also, this time he was saying the words after coming back from the dead, which gave them a special meaning they had lacked before. “I love you more than life itself. I love you more than anything I ever had or could hope to have. You’re the reason I get out of bed every morning –the reason why I came back from the brink of death. I love you and I want to spend each and every single day of the rest of my life with you.”

She smiled through her tears and gave out another dry sob.

“I love you too, Robin. Always have –even when you were a brat who made my life hell. Even when you were seventeen and we were betrothed and you still went around town chasing after everything in a skirt. Even when you selfishly and foolishly chose war over me. I loved you when you were away and I especially loved you when you returned and got yourself outlawed. I cannot think of a single moment in my life when I have _not_ loved you.”

He pulled her face down towards his and crashed his lips against hers.

They had kissed before, obviously. Different kinds of kisses as their relationship evolved.

At first, when they first got betrothed, they had been small pecks that he would steal from her when they were alone. They would usually end before she was fully aware of them beginning at all.

When he left for the Holy Land the first time they had shared their first real passionate kiss. She had been shouting at him and calling him names when suddenly he was before her and his lips were pressed tightly against her. For a moment she had completely yielded to that kiss before she realised that it was his way of saying goodbye. She had slapped him after that, and he had left.

During the five years he was gone, she would regret that slap more than anything she had said or done –or failed to say or do.

After his return they had gone back to the stolen kisses, only that they weren’t the same as before. This time there was a certain urgency hidden behind their seemingly innocent pecks –some hidden meaning none of them was brave enough to mention out loud.

There had been passionate kisses too, especially during the brief period of time when she had lived in the forest with him. These too had changed over time. For one, they didn’t end when she slapped him. In fact, they were pretty hard to terminate and more than once Marian had herself with her hands toying with Robin’s belt buckle. He would smile cheekily at her then and step back, but she could always tell he had to make great efforts to do so.

This kiss, however, was different from any other kiss they had shared before. There was the innocence of their pure love, but also the urgency of those who had been away for far too long as well as the fervour born from sheer desire. His hands travelled down her back before finally settling tightly around her waist and her own hands tousled his brownish hair. Suddenly Marian became _very_ aware of the fact that every bit of her was pressed against Robin. Surprisingly she didn’t mind one bit.

It was Robin who pulled back, knowing full well the direction their kiss was taking. But it wasn’t an easy task and he only managed to break the kiss and lean his forehead against hers. He was breathing hard and his skin was flushed, as hers probably was as well. When he spoke it was casually, in his normal voice. There were no traces of the intense heart-to-heart that they had just shared.

“So I take you’ll marry me now? Given that I’ve done what you asked of me, you know, I brought you the King back... How’s that for an engagement present?” he joked, shooting her one of his signature cheeky grins.

She rolled her eyes at him, but she still couldn’t stop smiling. “I suppose I may as well do. I doubt my prospects will be very good once word gets out that I’m the Nightwatchman. Men don’t usually like a wife that can kick their ass in a fight.”

He laughed good-naturally, his whole being becoming lighter by the second. This was what he loved about their relationship: Marian could make him forget even the worse of tragedies.

“It’s a good thing you’ve never bested me in a fight then.”

“I will, someday,” she promised, narrowing her eyes at him.

“Oh, I have no doubt you’ll _try..._ ” he murmured against her lips.

She shot him an angry glare.

“I _do_ love when you look at me in anger,” he reminded her, causing her to smile a little bit. “And I _do_ love _you_.”

It was impossible to resist him when he talked like that –so softly, so fervently, so lovingly... Marian didn’t really stand a chance.

“I love you too, Robin Hood,” she admitted defeatedly.

Her words awoke a distant memory in him and he smiled a little bit.

“Speaking of which...”

“What?” she asked defensively, pulling back so she could look him in the eye. He was smiling -a smile she knew too well. It was Robin’s _“You’ve Done Something Wrong And I Know About It And I’ll Never Let You Live It Down”_ smile. She had always hated that smile and today it made her feel weary.

“ _‘I will never stop loving Robin Hood’_?” he quoted. “Did you really think it was a good idea to provoke Gisborne when he had a sword pointing at you?”

It was said calmly enough, but she did not miss the definite accusation laying underneath.

Marian frowned. She hadn’t really expected him to bring this up right now, especially because he didn’t really have a right to. She wasn’t the only one who had ever come between Gisborne’s sword and the King. If he expected her to apologise for what she had done, he was in for a big disappointment.

“You are one to talk. I suppose you two were discussing the weather when he stabbed you.”

She slid away from him and crossed her arms over her chest. She didn’t want to get angry at him, but she feared he wouldn’t leave her a choice.

“He could have killed you, Marian!” he cried. That thought alone was scary, but the sudden lack of contact between them rendered the situation even worse, so his voice came out slightly higher than usual.

She was dealing with her own panic and guilt, so she didn’t notice. Also, the anger she had bravely pushed out of the way was coming back with a vengeance.

“As he could have killed _you_ . Oh, wait, I forgot. _He did!_ ” She spat.

“He did not!”

“For all intended purposes _he_ _did_.”

“It was different then!”

“How so? Gisborne was about to go after the King and I distracted him until help arrived. How is that any different than what _you_ did in the Holy Land?” she asked accusingly.

She was right, of course. Marian had had the same idea as him. Well, not quite.

“You didn’t reach for your sword, Marian. I was watching you -I saw the whole thing. You had your sword around your waist and your bow slinged across your shoulder and yet you made no move to reach for either.”

She could admit now that having Gisborne kill her with the same sword he had used on Robin would have been a huge mistake. But she couldn’t admit such thing to Robin. After everything he had gone through, she wouldn’t burden him with her own suicidal tendencies as well.

“As opposed to you, who ran towards Gisborne _without_ any sort of weapon,” she reminded him.

He groaned in frustration and clenched his fists in dismay.

“You’re impossible, Marian,” Robin whispered tiredly. “Every time I get remotely _close_ to having you back, you have to go and do something stupid. You’ll be de death of me, I’m sure.”

Oh, that was rich, coming from him.

“Really, you want to throw that card at me?” she said menacingly.

“What is _that_ supposed to mean?”

“It means that–”

“You two fighting again? Jeez, Maz, give the bloke a break!”

Robin chuckled and shot her a somewhat repentant look. Allan was right –it was far too early to be fighting. They would have all their lives for that.

“I’m sorry, master, I tried to keep them away for as long as possible, but they just had to come,” Much blabbered as he followed Allan down the stone steps.

“He started it,” Marian snorted, but she too was smiling as she watched the outlaws coming their way.

Robin rose to his feet carefully and went to meet his friends.

“You look different,” Allan commented when he was before his newly resuscitated leader. “Did you do anything different to your hair? No? Must be the lack of blood oozing from your stomach, then.”

Robin rolled his eyes.

“I’ve missed you too, Allan.”

“You scared the crap out of us,” Allan whispered as he embraced his friend tightly. “Don’t do that again.”

“I won’t. I promise.”

John stepped forward next and enveloped Robin in a bone-crushing hug.

“It’s good to have you back,” he stated.

“It’s good to _be_ back.”

He was then reintroduced to Kate –who nodded her head politely, a little embarrassed of being in the presence of a legend such as Robin– and Luke –who gave him a slightly awkward hug. Djaq checked his bandages –and complained at him for being up and about as she did so– before declaring that he was allowed to stay up, as long as he didn’t excessively tire himself.

“So, what do we do now?” Allan asked after some time.

“We go talk to the King,” Marian replied before anyone could. She had reclaimed her spot next to her betrothed and was currently wrapped around him, completely unconcerned with propiety and the likes.

“And why would we need to talk to the King?” Robin wondered suspiciously, looking down at her with such love radiating from his eyes that it was a wonder she remembered how to breathe.

Marian flashed him a smile before answering.

“Because, Robin, though I don’t know if I fancy the King giving me away, we will need someone to perform the ceremony if we hope to get married, don’t we?”

“Married, already?” he shot her one of his signature grins. “Are you that desperate to begin your life with me?”

She made a sound that was the most unbecoming sound for the daughter of the former Sheriff of Nottingham, but perfect for the future wife of Robin Hood.

“Not exactly. It’s just that I’ve already agreed to marry you twice and both times you ended up on your way to the Holy Land shortly thereafter. I don’t want to take any chances this time.”

She kissed him lightly on the lips and Robin very nearly groaned when she pulled away.

“Very well then,” he said a little breathlessly. “Come on, lads. Let’s go talk to the King!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://writerladymarianne.blogspot.com/


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so here it is. The last bit. The epilogue. The end. 
> 
> I can't tell you how much I've enjoyed writing this story (both times). I lost some steam towards the end, but that's my own fault -something to work on for the future. Still, I'm really proud of this story and I'm proud of what I've achieved in this second rewrite. Hope you feel the same way. 
> 
> Now that this is over I will keep my promise and go back to TGA (ISTC). Summer is coming, which as you all know is a dead time. I also have some projects in real life that require my attention, but I *think* that in a few months I will be able to start replying to old reviews. Maybe sooner, who knows. Still, I promise that story is next on my list. In the meantime, you can check up on me via my blog, which I'll try to keep up-to-date so that you have a better idea of a potential timeline. 
> 
> Anyway, I'm not going to waste any more of your time. 
> 
> Without further ado, here's what you want to read.
> 
> Talk to you later!

**CHAPTER XI – EPILOGUE**

As it turned out, getting things settled was much simpler than Robin could have predicted. The talk with the King was short and to the point, and though there were a few moments when Marian’s displeasure was a bit too obvious, the sovereign wisely chose not to say anything about it. He had heard enough about Marian to know that their difference in rank would hardly deter her anger. He could take a few nasty looks and an occasional snide comment for once. He deserved most of them anyway.

Richard gave his blessing for the wedding of his most trusted subject to the woman of his dreams, not that either one of them was really  _ asking  _ him for it. They would be wed with or without his permission, Marian pointed out (much to Robin’s amusement), but given who they were, it seemed polite to talk to him first. 

“I wouldn’t dream of coming in the way of my friend’s happiness, Lady Marian, and I know for a fact that he will never be happy unless he’s by your side,” he assured her. 

“Good then. We’re all on the same page.”

It was agreed that the ceremony would take place in Locksley in a week’s time. That would give the King the time to deal with some business around the shire and the outlaws the chance to reacquaintance themselves with the commodities of a proper home.

Robin was quite eager to leave for Locksley immediately, but Much refused to move until his former master had ingested a healthy breakfast. 

“I rather you didn’t faint and fall down your horse, Robin.”

“I’m with Much on this one; you do look as if a gust of wind might knock you down,” Allan chimed in. 

“I appreciate your concern, but I can assure you that it will not,” Robin said.

“Regardless, I would feel better if you had some food in your system.”

Sighing theatrically -because, though he would never admit it, the truth was that he was a bit hungry- he sat himself at the table and allowed Much to fix him a plate.

“You shouldn’t worry so much, Much. You’ll go prematurely grey.”

“Not a full day ago you were certain that everyone you knew and loved was dead and buried. I wouldn’t go around telling people that they worry too much if I were you.” Will pointed out. 

“Okay, point taken.” Robin conceded. “We should all try to relax a bit.”

“Should be easy enough, I reckon. As long as we all promise not to go charging weaponless towards anyone, I don’t see why we’d have much to worry about.”

“Don’t joke about that, Allan!”

“Too soon?”

It seemed as if the whole village was waiting for them when they finally arrived at Locksley, as well as some people from other villages around the shire. Robin quickly explained the events of the past few days to them and announced his imminent wedding to Lady Marian in just a few more days. The news was received with great joy amongst the townspeople, who clapped and cheered for some time, much to Robin’s delight and Marian’s mortification -while the young man had always enjoyed being the centre of attention, she usually prefered to keep a low profile; having so many eyes fixed on her made her feel slightly uncomfortable, even if she appreciated the support. Amongst those most excited was Thorton, the old butler back at Locksley manor, who could barely contain his tears as he hugged each former outlaw tightly –even Much, who he had never been a very big fan of. 

Kate was allowed to return to her mother’s house, much to both women’s delight. Little John reclaimed his old house while Luke, Will and Djaq took possession of the Scarlett’s old lodgings. Allan refused Robin’s invitation to stay with him at the manor and asked instead if he would be allowed to stay back at the camp –at least for a few days until he could figure out what to do with his newfound freedom. Much and Marian stayed at the manor as guests, the former until he could come in possession of the lands Robin had promised him and the later until she could start calling the place her own. 

The week passed relatively quickly for everyone but Robin. 

After that first day back at the castle, Djaq had gone back to her overly-cautious ways and had instructed Robin to remain in bed for most of the day. If it had been just her, he probably would have been able to strike some kind of deal that would have given him a bit more liberty, but she had had the sense to involve Much, which had reduced Robin’s chances from “small” to “non-existent”. The man made it his personal mission to make sure that his friend got all the rest that he hadn’t gotten while he was away, even going as far as staying perched outside Robin’s door for most of the day. 

“I don’t get it. On the one, hand I’m so weak that a simple trip down the stairs might kill me, but I’m also strong enough that I might escape if I’m left unsupervised for too long. Something doesn’t add up,” Robin complained one day to Marian. Fortunately for him, his jailer had no qualms about allowing her into the room, so Robin’s days were spent mostly in her company, which was how he would have chosen to spend his time even if he had been allowed out of the room. But being told what to do was like having an itch he couldn’t scratch, and he wanted to scratch it -badly.

Marian chuckled and snuggled closer to him.

“Much  _ knows _ you’re too weak but he doesn’t think  _ you _ do. That’s why he feels the need to keep guard,” she explained. 

“I think I know how far I can go. I don’t need Much or Djaq to tell me how much I can push myself.”

“Maybe not, but you do need Djaq to clear you to leave this room. I’m getting married on Monday, Robin. With or without you there.”

Fortunately for both of them, when Monday came Djaq decided that he was doing much better so Marian didn’t have to prove what she had meant when she said she would get married without him. 

The ceremony was beautiful. People came from all over the shire to celebrate the union of two of their favourite heroes. The King performed the service; John walked Marian down the aisle. Much cried –which wasn’t surprising at all– and Allan cried –which was only a little bit surprising. The bride and groom exchanged vows and it was more perfect than any of them could have hoped for.

And that was it.

The King left for London the very next day, taking Vaisey with him to be trialled for his crimes. 

Everyone settled back into their lives, though they never forgot their mission. Neither Lord nor Lady Locksley allowed their peasants to go hungry again, though they never felt the need to resort to hoods and masks for that. 

And thus concludes the tale of the outlaws as such. That isn’t to say there weren’t any more adventures waiting for them, for there certainly were. They all lived long and full lives, full of exciting activities and friendship. They eventually returned to Sherwood, too, after King Richard passed away. But that, I’m afraid, is a tale for another time. 

**THE END**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://writerladymarianne.blogspot.com/


End file.
